Bitter Rose: Color Me Crushed

by Melody Carlson

Book Overview

Maggie blames her mom for the family's disintegration: "She's driven him away with her constant nagging and complaining and arguing. Honestly, who could stand to live with that woman?" she vents to... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1576835367
• ISBN13: 9781576835364
• Release Date: January 2006
• Publisher: Th1nk Books
• Length: 217 Pages
• Weight: 0.55 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.5" x 8.3"
• Age Range: 12 years and up
• Grade Range: Grade 7 and higher

Customer Reviews

Family Feud

Maggie's family is going through a very rough time. Her parents have separated and on the verge of getting a divorce. Their bitterness spreads to Maggie who wants her parents to get back together and realize that they can work things out. But this won't happen because Maggie blames her mom for her dad leaving. Feeling as though her family has failed her, she turns to her aunt with whom she can share her true feelings with. However when the truth about her parents' split comes out and a tragedy strikes the family, Maggie has to learn whether she really wants this bitterness to take control of her life. Once again, Melody Carlson focuses on another subject that is touchy among the Christian church. Divorce is not something a lot of people like to talk about. Therefore teens who are in families that have divorce often have no one to talk to and go through their suffering alone. Maggie's pain is understandable. No one wants to see their family split up. You don't want to see the two people who are supposed to promote family unity just give up and walk out on you. It makes sense that Maggie is bitter and cynical towards her parents. I just didn't like though how she didn't have all the facts and kept lashing out at her mother and blaming her for the split. She didn't give her a chance to explain and kept siding with her dad. So when the truth finally comes out, it hurts Maggie more than anything. I'm glad the ending of the novel doesn't end happily. Many Christian novels have everyone making up with the family getting back together and hugs all around. Unfortunately that is not always realistic. Maggie's faith keeps her strong throughout this whole ordeal. There is a subplot which involves teen drinking and the ill effects of it. With both parents involved with their own affairs, there's no one for Maggie to turn to so she gives into peer pressure and then pays for the consequences. This is an excellent book for teens who have experienced divorce. Highly recommended teen reading.

Divorce Court!

Oh no, this is huge!!! Maggie comes home to find that her parents are getting a divorce. Maggie is so confused as to how her Christian parents split up. She stays at her best friend's house and tries to figure things out. Maggie suspects that it's her mom's fault that her parent's got a divorce, because her mom is always yelling. Maggie's dad gets a cool new apartment, but finds out that her dad has a secret that he won't tell Maggie. She tries to talk to her best friend Claire, but she doesn't understand and she can't tell the rest her family because they don't believe in "divorces." She gets a job at her Aunt Louise's restaurant to get her mind off things, and she becomes really close to her Aunt. She also thinks that her mom and dad might get back together, but when a family member dies it puts a hole in Maggie's heart. Maggie hopes and prays that her mom and dad will get back together so that she can move on with her life. The thing I love most about Maggie is that even when her parents split up, she always turned to God for help and she stayed strong. I was really surprised when she went to work at her Aunt's restaurant. That's what I would also do to get my mind off things. The one thing that I liked least about Maggie is that she blamed somebody for something that she didn't even know was true. Like when she blamed the divorce on her mom and later her dad, I didn't really think that was fair. I also didn't like when Ned, a boy she liked, took her to go snow sledding with his friend and Maggie had a ton to drink. I was very unhappy with her. All in all, this book really was good.

Outstanding book, wonderfully done...

This is a great book, by Melody Carson, about a girl who is a senior in high school, Maggie, whose parents are suddenly getting a divorce. I think this is the only book that I have read, that truly captures the impact of divorce on the kids in the family. Maggie is torn between her father who she loves, and her mother who she never got along with. When she learns the real reason of the divorce, she is shocked, hurt, and stunned that this could happen to her family, but she also is trying to piece the family she once knew, back together with what little information she has. This is a real life lesson in this book, and that is EVERY family has problems. Every family out there has something wrong, and the grass is not always greener on the other side of the fence. This was a novel that wasn't exciting to read, but had some truths in it, and that made it worthwhile to read.

Bitter Rose

Bitter Rose by Melody Carlson is about a girl whose parents are splitting up. The girl is named Maggie. Maggie is trying to get her parents back together. Maggie finds out that the reason her mom kicked her dad out was because he was cheating on her. In the end, Maggie realized to stay out of it even though her parents don't get back together. When I read this book, I thought it was going to be boring. After I got farther in the book, it got more interesting. The lesson I learned was to stay out of other people's business. People who like the other color books in this series would like this one. I would love to read more books by Melody Carlson. All of her books try to teach all of us a lesson.