Camilla's Roses

Character after character in Camilla's Roses by BERNICE L. MCFADDEN made a memory in my heart and mind. From the beginning I was touched by Maggie. Throughout the novel Maggie would touch me in a special way. She was considered simple minded. I find it's those who are thought of as less than sensible who have the most love to give to other people. In the novel the ladies in the family have the characteristics of a rose. It's so fitting that their middle name is Rose. So you have Maggie Rose, Velma Rose and Camilla Rose. Maggie wasn't the only character who touched my heart. I was touched by each woman in a different way. As for the men, Camilla's husband is the most honest. Yes, he's flawed but again, he didn't know how to handle what life served him unexpectedly. Perhaps, my favor. Not knowing how to ease their emotional sorrows they chose ways that brought them more harm in the end. Leroy Brown and Audrey really touched me.At this very moment I can see Audrey riding Camilla's bike up and down the street trying to catch a bit of her childhood again because adult life isn't as free and wonderful as childhood. Childhood is that special time when we really believe gumdrops might grow on trees. There is also Retha, the great aunt in the family who bares her deepest scas in order to help Camilla understand what life has brought her way. Each woman gives and gives and gives. Each woman falters, but who doesn't fall down as we learn to walk through life. Velma is the true matriarch. Every child becomes her child to feed, to scold, to love and to give a bed to sleep in each night. She is the kind of person whose bark is bigger than her bite. She wouldn't hurt a butterfly.Then, there is Camilla. Camilla will bare the pain of genetics in her life. What comes to one person in a family will at some point come again to another person in the family tree due to no fault of their making. Camilla is brave. Can we ever go home again? For me Camilla answered that question. The novel is filled to the brim and running over with love between a man and a woman and sometimes love between those whom we don't expect to love one another in life. Overall the novel is about the mystery of life. We don't know where we will walk until we've walked that path. In other words the past is all that is known. Sometimes it isn't grasped fully. The present is happiness mixed with a struggle. Sadly, for some people today brings no happiness at all. It is all hurt. Tomorrow is a well spiced cooked stew of not knowing anything until it arrives on our doorstep. In the long run children, men and women are all survivors grateful to have a planet on which to live out the acts and scenes of their particular play.bernicemcfadden,Thank you Ms. Bernice L. McFadden for making this play seem so real.urbanext.illinois.edu/roses/historybernicemcfadden

In another amazing piece of work from this author, readers are drawn into the lives of the Rose women....beginning with sisters Velma and Maggie. Velma, the eldest, is the plain jane of the two; Maggie, although blessed with beauty, is definitely lacking in the brains department. The beautiful, naive Maggie is seduced by Velma's boyfriend Lloyd, and caught in the act. Velma is filled with anger and an incredible sense of betrayal; Maggie, of course is unaware of any wrongdoing ("but we were just loving, Velma, like the animals do"). Their father, however, meets with Lloyd and the decision is made that he will marry Maggie. Lloyed genuinely loves Maggie, and Maggie loves Lloyd (that's all she knows to do), and all is well (Velma moves on and marries someone of her own) until tragedy strikes...leaving Maggie widowed, scarred, forever mourning her beloved Lloyd and changing the course of their lives forever. Life finds Velma raising her children, with husband Chuck, and then raising her children's children, all the while struggling to make ends meet. Maggie lives with Velma also--forever mentally and physically scarred by a tragedy long ago. But Velma's biggest cross to bear throughout this tale is Audrey Rose--beloved child who grows up to love a monster, court the "white lady" and all of the evils that accompany that addiction, and abandon her child--the lovely Camilla Rose. Raised by her grandparents, like the rest of her cousins, Camilla grows up viewing her blackness as a cross to bear...and associates that with everything negative in her life; poverty, her mother's heroin addiction, sickness, joblessness and the like. Subconsciously, Camilla's goal is to leave it all behind....she leaves for college, concocts a fictitious past, lightens her skin, and abandons her family. She marries light, has a child, and almost manages to leave it all behind...until she is confronted with a family legacy that may seek to claim her life.Wonderfully constructed, Ms. McFadden's work flows much like poetry. Her manipulation of the written word is incredibly visual...truly a beautiful work.

Nothing beats a Bernice McFadden story. The remarkable thing about her writing is that the story moves at such a regular pace before I even realized it I was more than half through the book in one day. I just love the way she can take anybody story and make it so intriguing that you can’t stop reading.I loved this book. I think this will be my Bernice McFadden year of reading.

4 stars.This is one of the saddest stories I have ever read but it was so good. Camilla is a girl with a seriously rough past, where it seemed like the hits just keep on coming. And grows up to move on with her life never to look to look back, but when she is faced with the presence of cancer, Camilla must come to turns with all the self hate and pain that she has buried deep inside herself before it's too late.There was nothing happy about this whole book. It was pretty much a sad and sometimes painful read from page one, but it kept a strong hold on me. Ms. McFadden is a brilliant storyteller.

I truly enjoyed this book. Camilla’s middle name is Rose just like all the women on her maternal side of the family. Camilla was born to a young mother and a drug addict father who vanished out of her life before she came out of the womb. Camilla was raised in her grandma’s Velma Rose house along with other family members. Camilla suffered from an identity crisis and abandoned her family. This book deals with several real issues that are important breast cancer, drug addiction, and abandonment. Awesome book!!

This was my least favorite of her books and I have read most of them. I found this book disjointed and Uninteresting.

Another fabulous novel by a fabulous authoress and my favorite authoress at that! CAMILLA's ROSES I have read several times already since I bought it and I love it!

Depuis Sugar et This Bitter Earth, je suis éprise de la plume de Bernice L McFadden. Camilla's Rose est dans la continuité de son style qui vous plonge au coeur de l'histoire des la premiere page et vous aide a comprendre le parcours du personnage via des flash back très enrichissant. Ici, rien n'est plus important que la famille à part Dieu.