Notes on Her Colour

'It wasn't long before my wet and sticky fascination with life beyond the walls of our home could be read all over my face like soot.'

Gabrielle has inherited the ability to change the colour of her skin from her mother, Tallulah. They guard their power carefully within the walls of a home that's been bleached completely white. This is the doing of Gabrielle's father, Robert. After battling his executive-level colleagues all day at the office as a man of colour, he needs everything in his house to be white - including his wife and daughter.

This is a house with secrets. Robert does not know that Talullah keeps a rainbow of spices stored in baggies and sewn into the lining of her handbag. Nor does he know that when he's away, Gabrielle and Tallulah let their skin pass through a spectrum of bright, dark, rebellious colours. But when Gabrielle discovers a love for the piano, she also finds she can change her skin, and find joy and acceptance, without her mother nearby. Gabrielle is learning of a world beyond her family's carefully coded existence, and her mother is watching.

Notes on Her Colour is a novel where the strange and surreal meets the kitsch of Florida as it explores the dynamic of a family traumatised by racial violence in North America. It's a glittering, corrosive, witty tale about race, privilege, music and queerness.

At its heart, it's a story about a mother, told by her daughter.

'The Florida that American-Australian author Jennifer Neal brings to life in her book, thick with humidity and vulnerable to catastrophic weather events — where 'survival is a season' — is the evocative backdrop to this story of trauma, grief, queer love and transcendent joy.' — Sonia Nair, Books + Publishing

ISBN: 9781761044977 | Published: 23 May 2023 | Trade paperback | 336 pages