The Gold Rose

The Gold Rose is a good story with an impressive amount of great action. It runs the full gamut of human emotion, and it takes the underdog motif to a refreshing level – thrice!

The story follows the adventures of three women—Charlotte, Pinkie and Babe—as they traverse a number of horrible obstacles as they grow from young girls into young women. Each woman has her own unique story in her own unique setting, ranging from Texas to Mexico to China and beyond. The only similarity between the three is that they all need some type of help to break free of the oppression that encompasses them.

Each of the three stories is told separately, with chapters alternating between them. Charlotte’s story is told in the first person narrative, while the other two are told in third person.

The timeline of the stories spans from just before World War Two to the late 1950s. However, although the three stories are told between alternating chapters, they are not told chronologically. Time-wise, Charlotte’s story starts after the other two, despite it beginning in the first chapter. It doesn’t seem to me that Charlotte is telling the stories of Pinkie and Babe to the reader, which make this timeline presentation a bit offsetting to me.

I think the author did a great job with the overall description. With the story taking places in a number of countries, there are plenty of opportunities for description to be included without being overdone. Further, the author incorporated more than just the sense of sight. For example, this is how the author described a hallway one of the characters came upon: “The hallway reeks of urine-soaked carpet, almost making me gag. The scent-ghosts of smoke and a thousand spilled liquors haunt the soured corridors.”

Within each woman’s story, there are other significant characters that are unique to that story. Some are pretty integral to the plot. These characters somewhat disappear from the story and are only brought up again as backstory near the end of the book. In each story, it is only logical that there will be a union between these other characters and the main women at some point. I think these reunions could and should have been handled differently in the story. I acknowledge, however, that this would make the book longer. Maybe that’s why the author handled it the way she did.

It may appear by some of my comments that I did not enjoy the story. That’s not true! I did enjoy it. I thought the storylines were very original, and the situations these girls were put in are somewhat shocking, yet highly believable. I happen to love good underdog stories—and this is one of them. Actually, it’s three of them!