Rose Madder

"Rose Madder" is in my top four favourite Stephen King books (next to "Carrie", "Misery", and "The Eyes of the Dragon", in case you were wondering). In it, a woman named Rosie runs away from her abusive husband, and sets up a new life in the big city. One day, she walks into a pawnshop with the intentions of trading in her engagement ring, and discovers an old oil painting which seems to be calling to her to buy it. The painting depicts a woman in a rose madder dress, standing on a hill, looking down at a ruined temple with her back to the viewer. Rosie buys the painting and takes it back to her flat, but, this being a Stephen King novel, seriously weird things start to happen with it.

I won't give too much away, but I did want to draw the woman from the painting. Her dress is the closest I could get to rose madder with my cheap set of colouring pencils, but I think it's turned out okay. The black smears were deliberate, but you'll have to check the book to find out what they are.

Rose Madder (c) Stephen King.