Vanessa Hawkins

The Sinister Portrait of Cherie Rose Vanessa Hawkins

When orphan Cherie Rose realizes she's fallen in love with her ma mère's murderer, her obsession with serial killers begins. In an underworld rife with irrational impulse, shameless sexual acts, and slaughter, love is most profound in monsters. When Cherie finds herself in the welcoming embrace of the Circus of Sorrows, she believes she has finally found a home and a lover to rival her mother's killer: the Gray Man. But when her new partner, the flamboyant Ringmaster Manny begins to change, Cherie finds herself embroiled much deeper in the netherworld than she thought possible. A man in black, able to seamlessly blend into the shadows, appears one night in an ally. Wielding a bloody knife and gnarled grin, he guides Cherie into the depths of Gloryhill: a city of woe and violence. It is here she meets the Queen of Hearts, a burglar of men's desires and possibly the only one that can reveal the truth about Cherie's past. Will Cherie find her Gray Man? Or will her pursuit of monsters have her bloating alongside the Alabaster riverbank? In a world of nightmares, can dreams really come true?