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Stella: Unrepentant Madam
A glamorous entrepreneur and well-known madam, Stella prospered by offering the best of drink, food and other sensuous entertainment to society's elite players. Her scandalous lifestyle and fiery temper brought her infamy and power in a time when women were permitted little of either.
198 pages, Paperback
First published December 6, 2005
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Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
January 21, 2018
For me, this was an interesting book for many reasons. I have never read a book about prostitutes, I know too little about this aspect of the place where Stella lived for much of her life (and where I live now) and I was endlessly fascinated by the disreputable nature of the politicians and lawyers of Victoria. Of the third reason, perhaps my true naiveté is revealed.
Stella: Unrepentant Madam is the story of a person who made the best of her life, was creative, businesslike, and bold. One must acknowledge the fact that she was a Madam, and, as such, was perhaps not the most virtuous of women. Nevertheless, we all live in glass houses of one sort or another. As readers we need insight in order the understand the motivations of others and this book does document a life that was lived through pain, disappointment, occasional joy, and too frequent change in both location and human relationships. To me, this was a book that helped me understand Stella as a person.
I found the book somewhat breezy in its tone and often rather superficial. I would have liked a more in depth analysisis of Stella’s motivations and psychology. I do not, however, think that was the author’s intent. Still, the last lonely and painful years of Stella’s life were given too little attention.
One of the books many strengths were the numerous pictures, and there was a Glossary, Endnotes, and Sources sections provided for further clarification and depth. All in all, a book worth reading and I would not hesitate to recommend it to anyone interested in a very interesting person.
Stella: Unrepentant Madam is the story of a person who made the best of her life, was creative, businesslike, and bold. One must acknowledge the fact that she was a Madam, and, as such, was perhaps not the most virtuous of women. Nevertheless, we all live in glass houses of one sort or another. As readers we need insight in order the understand the motivations of others and this book does document a life that was lived through pain, disappointment, occasional joy, and too frequent change in both location and human relationships. To me, this was a book that helped me understand Stella as a person.
I found the book somewhat breezy in its tone and often rather superficial. I would have liked a more in depth analysisis of Stella’s motivations and psychology. I do not, however, think that was the author’s intent. Still, the last lonely and painful years of Stella’s life were given too little attention.
One of the books many strengths were the numerous pictures, and there was a Glossary, Endnotes, and Sources sections provided for further clarification and depth. All in all, a book worth reading and I would not hesitate to recommend it to anyone interested in a very interesting person.
September 5, 2020
I bought this book at Frog on the Bog in Wells, BC, along with a book about Barkerville, because when you're in Barkerville you are thrust into BC History, which inspires you to learn more.
This is an interesting and irksome story. Stella is fiercely independent, as she has every right to be. The woman is just trying to run a business, which clearly there is a market for, and keeps getting hassled, persecuted, cheated. I can't help but compare and contrast the lives of prostitutes then and now...
I look forward to checking out all the spots in Victoria mentioned in the book next time I'm in that city.
This is an interesting and irksome story. Stella is fiercely independent, as she has every right to be. The woman is just trying to run a business, which clearly there is a market for, and keeps getting hassled, persecuted, cheated. I can't help but compare and contrast the lives of prostitutes then and now...
I look forward to checking out all the spots in Victoria mentioned in the book next time I'm in that city.
July 9, 2020
I enjoyed learning about Stella Carroll, a local madam from the turn-of-the-century in Victoria, British Columbia. The book was interesting, but unfortunately, the copyediting kept tripping me up, due to the misplaced and missing commas. Putting that aside, though, I found the book to be well-researched and the photos were interesting and abundant, which helped me to visualize the people involved in Stella's life. Worth the read!
February 20, 2025
🖊 🌵 ⊱Quite dry reading, and maybe the madame was dull, too. 🗑 Conversely, other readers may find this true story their feather boa across the back of a chair. Hot cha-cha. It was not for me. Now, screan, "STELLA"!
🎨Illustrated.
જ⁀🟣 Kindle.
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🎨Illustrated.
જ⁀🟣 Kindle.
༻ ༺ ༅ ✬ ༅ ༻ ༺ ༅ ✬ ༅ ༻༺ ༅ ✬ ༅ ༻ ༺ ༅ ✬ ༅ ༻ ༺
August 10, 2021
Not as interesting as I'd hoped, mostly details her time in court.
August 13, 2025
What was there was well written but it was pretty surface level. I would have liked something that dug a bit deeper.
August 21, 2025
I really enjoyed this book. It's kind of an odd topic... brothels and madams from back in the day but it was quite interesting.
April 14, 2011
What a life!! It's always interesting to try and review a work of non-fiction. Obviously the story is what it is - and in this case, what a story! I am not sure why the author chose to write about Stella: she is not particularly famous (or infamous). I would expect that her personality and lifestyle didn't differ much from other madams of the time, but her life makes for a rich and colourful read.
Linda Eversole's writing style is straight-forward and flows easily. I forgot, from time to time, that I was reading non-fiction. 'Stella' reads like a novel. The pictures interspersed throughout the story are fantastic. It's nice that the author has included these so that long (and often boring) setting and character descriptions can be avoided. After all 'a picture is worth a thousand words'.
Non-fiction is not my favorite genre, as a rule. I often find it hard to get into the story and become distracted and side-tracked by statistics, descriptions and political explanations. The author managed to avoid these for the most part and still give the reader a good sense of the times.
I was most impressed, I think, by the portrayal of Stella as she was, warts and all. There was no attempt to downplay her faults or over play her positive traits. So often the characters of the 'wild west' are so overblown that they become less than what they were.
The biggest criticism I have of the book would have to be the ending. OK - I know, NON-fiction. The ending is what it is. But it felt like the author tried a little too hard to play on the emotions of the reader at the end of the novel. Something she had managed not to do throughout the rest of the book.
I suspect that, had I lived at the end of the 19th century (that's the 1800s, right?), I would have been Ma Ingalls ... but I would have wished to be Stella!
Linda Eversole's writing style is straight-forward and flows easily. I forgot, from time to time, that I was reading non-fiction. 'Stella' reads like a novel. The pictures interspersed throughout the story are fantastic. It's nice that the author has included these so that long (and often boring) setting and character descriptions can be avoided. After all 'a picture is worth a thousand words'.
Non-fiction is not my favorite genre, as a rule. I often find it hard to get into the story and become distracted and side-tracked by statistics, descriptions and political explanations. The author managed to avoid these for the most part and still give the reader a good sense of the times.
I was most impressed, I think, by the portrayal of Stella as she was, warts and all. There was no attempt to downplay her faults or over play her positive traits. So often the characters of the 'wild west' are so overblown that they become less than what they were.
The biggest criticism I have of the book would have to be the ending. OK - I know, NON-fiction. The ending is what it is. But it felt like the author tried a little too hard to play on the emotions of the reader at the end of the novel. Something she had managed not to do throughout the rest of the book.
I suspect that, had I lived at the end of the 19th century (that's the 1800s, right?), I would have been Ma Ingalls ... but I would have wished to be Stella!
February 7, 2017
This book really opened my eyes to a part of Western history I never knew about. Although Stella's life was centred on the business of prostitution, it showed how much women of the late 1800s had to work to thrive in a man's world in other ways, which could include, well...the only other option was real estate.
August 22, 2015
This was a short little book detailing Ms. Stella's life- a madam who ran her own brothel and worked in Canada and the US. She had an interesting life, was independent, and quite ahead of her time. Unfortunately however there just wasn't enough interesting information to warrant a whole book. The author's writing is pretty bland and the entire book is the same four events happening over and over again : Stella opens a new brothel, she gets in trouble with the law, moves and reopens a new brothel somewhere else, gets married to a new abusive husband. It wasn't a bad read and it WAS interesting but I don't think I would recommend it to someone and I would never read it again. There just wasn't really anything to this book.
August 8, 2013
Interesting biography of a woman who ran an upper-class bordello in Victoria BC in the early 1900s. Unfortunately more superficial than I was hoping; the author never explores why or how Stella got into the line of business she did, how the social prejudice against her manifested (aside from police interference) and how she felt about that prejudice. Very much a strictly-facts biography, with minimal exploration of the "why" behind the "what" she did.
September 18, 2016
It's always interesting to learn the history of the place you grew up, especially when it isn't in any history book you'd be allowed to read as a child. And, I was intrigued by the fact that prostitution was a business, a business run by a woman. Unconventional, yes, empowering, yes (for the madam). Stella was definitely a force to be reckoned with in her business life.
November 24, 2015
What was an independent, unconventional woman to do in the 1890s? Become a madam, of course. This is the story of Stella Carroll, who ran brothels up and down the West Coast of Canada and the U.S.
June 13, 2021
Maiku:
West Coast Madam came
to Victoria; set up
her high end parlours.
West Coast Madam came
to Victoria; set up
her high end parlours.
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews