Colored Television: A Novel (Gma Book Club Pick)
A NATIONAL BESTSELLER
A GOOD MORNING AMERICA BOOK CLUB PICK
A WASHINGTON POST TOP 10 BOOK OF THE YEAR
A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF 2024
“A laugh-out-loud cultural comedy… This is the New Great American Novel, and Danzy Senna has set the standard.” –LA Times
“Funny, foxy and fleet…The jokes are good, the punches land, the dialogue is tart.” –Dwight Garner, The New York Times
A brilliant take on love and ambition, failure and reinvention, and the racial-identity-industrial complex from the bestselling author of Caucasia
Jane has high hopes that her life is about to turn around. After a long, precarious stretch bouncing among sketchy rentals and sublets, she and her family are living in luxury for a year, house-sitting in the hills above Los Angeles. The gig magically coincides with Jane’s sabbatical, giving her the time and space she needs to finish her second novel—a centuries-spanning epic her artist husband, Lenny, dubs her “mulatto War and Peace.” Finally, some semblance of stability and success seems to be within her grasp.
But things don’t work out quite as hoped. Desperate for a plan B, like countless writers before her Jane turns her gaze to Hollywood. When she finagles a meeting with Hampton Ford, a hot producer with a major development deal at a streaming network, he seems excited to work with a “real writer,” and together they begin to develop “the Jackie Robinson of biracial comedies.” Things finally seem to be going right for Jane—until they go terribly wrong.
Funny, piercing, and page turning, Colored Television is Senna’s most on-the-pulse, ambitious, and rewarding novel yet.
A GOOD MORNING AMERICA BOOK CLUB PICK
A WASHINGTON POST TOP 10 BOOK OF THE YEAR
A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF 2024
“A laugh-out-loud cultural comedy… This is the New Great American Novel, and Danzy Senna has set the standard.” –LA Times
“Funny, foxy and fleet…The jokes are good, the punches land, the dialogue is tart.” –Dwight Garner, The New York Times
A brilliant take on love and ambition, failure and reinvention, and the racial-identity-industrial complex from the bestselling author of Caucasia
Jane has high hopes that her life is about to turn around. After a long, precarious stretch bouncing among sketchy rentals and sublets, she and her family are living in luxury for a year, house-sitting in the hills above Los Angeles. The gig magically coincides with Jane’s sabbatical, giving her the time and space she needs to finish her second novel—a centuries-spanning epic her artist husband, Lenny, dubs her “mulatto War and Peace.” Finally, some semblance of stability and success seems to be within her grasp.
But things don’t work out quite as hoped. Desperate for a plan B, like countless writers before her Jane turns her gaze to Hollywood. When she finagles a meeting with Hampton Ford, a hot producer with a major development deal at a streaming network, he seems excited to work with a “real writer,” and together they begin to develop “the Jackie Robinson of biracial comedies.” Things finally seem to be going right for Jane—until they go terribly wrong.
Funny, piercing, and page turning, Colored Television is Senna’s most on-the-pulse, ambitious, and rewarding novel yet.
BUY THE BOOK
Community Reviews
thenextgoodbook.com
What’s it about?
Jane has been struggling with her second novel for years. She is teaching at a mid-level college and finally has a sabbatical and time to finish her sprawling book on mulattos. She and her artist husband Lenny, and their two children, are house-sitting for a friend while he is in Australia for a year. Life seems pretty manageable but that book….
What did it make me think about?
Race.
Should I read it?
This goes in an ever-expanding pile of books that I greatly admire and did not enjoy reading. I like Danzy Senna’s writing, and this book has gotten a lot of well-deserved hype. There are countless wry observations about race, marriage, L.A., the entertainment industry, publishing, etc. However, I did not like these people. Not a one! For me, this means I am not invested in the characters and don’t care too much about what happens to them. I did enjoy the last 30 pages of the book- but it was tedious getting there. This book is worth reading- but I don’t expect everyone will love it.
Quote-
“Jane’s father once told her that white people believed, deep in their hearts, that Black people would all choose to become white if they could. But Black people didn’t want to be white, he had told her. They only wanted to have what white people had. He had said race was always about money, and money was always about race. That’s what white people didn’t understand. Black people wanted only a big yellow Victorian on the hill, not to be the white people who lived there.”
What’s it about?
Jane has been struggling with her second novel for years. She is teaching at a mid-level college and finally has a sabbatical and time to finish her sprawling book on mulattos. She and her artist husband Lenny, and their two children, are house-sitting for a friend while he is in Australia for a year. Life seems pretty manageable but that book….
What did it make me think about?
Race.
Should I read it?
This goes in an ever-expanding pile of books that I greatly admire and did not enjoy reading. I like Danzy Senna’s writing, and this book has gotten a lot of well-deserved hype. There are countless wry observations about race, marriage, L.A., the entertainment industry, publishing, etc. However, I did not like these people. Not a one! For me, this means I am not invested in the characters and don’t care too much about what happens to them. I did enjoy the last 30 pages of the book- but it was tedious getting there. This book is worth reading- but I don’t expect everyone will love it.
Quote-
“Jane’s father once told her that white people believed, deep in their hearts, that Black people would all choose to become white if they could. But Black people didn’t want to be white, he had told her. They only wanted to have what white people had. He had said race was always about money, and money was always about race. That’s what white people didn’t understand. Black people wanted only a big yellow Victorian on the hill, not to be the white people who lived there.”
This was a good story, very well written, but I did not like It. Jane and her husband were INSUFFERABLE and their lives were chaotic. Whew! They stressed me clean out.
It was clear what was going to happen with Jane’s manuscript from the beginning, but even so I really enjoyed the humor and voice of this novel.
“Jane's father once told her that white people believed, deep in their hearts, that Black people would all choose to become white if they could. But Black people didn't want to be white, he had told her. They only wanted to have what white people had. He had said race was always about money, and money was always about race. That's what white people didn't understand. Black people wanted only a big yellow Victorian on the hill, not to be the white people who lived there.”
See Jane run. To LA. After struggling with her mixed-race identity, her faultering self-confidence as a writer, her love for her husband and family, and her envy and longing for the high life.
While comical at times, this is a satire that exposes some very uncomfortable things about the experience of being mixed race in America. It does so using some exaggerations and sterotypes, as well as with some ugly realities.
It's pretty niche for writers or those who know the Hollywood Machine, but one can still learn something here.
Great writing! Jane and Lenny housesit in Brads house while Jane supposedly writes a novel while on sabbatical. Like life, nothing turns out as planned.
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