Pure Colour

A Novel

By: Sheila Heti

Narrated by: Sheila Heti

Pure Colour is a galaxy of an audiobook: explosive, celestially bright, huge, and streaked with beauty. It is a contemporary bible, an atlas of feeling, and an absurdly funny guide to the great (and terrible) things about being alive. Sheila Heti is a philosopher of modern experience, and she has reimagined what a book can hold.

Here we are, just living in the first draft of Creation, which was made by some great artist, who is now getting ready to tear it apart.

In this first draft of the world, a woman named Mira leaves home to study. There, she meets Annie, whose tremendous power opens Mira’s chest like a portal—to what, she doesn’t know. When Mira is older, her beloved father dies, and his spirit passes into her. Together, they become a leaf on a tree. But photosynthesis gets boring, and being alive is a problem that cannot be solved, even by a leaf. Eventually, Mira must remember the human world she’s left behind, including Annie, and choose whether or not to return.

A Macmillan Audio production from Farrar, Straus and Giroux

©2022 Sheila Heti (P)2022 Macmillan Audio

Critic reviews

2022, New York Times Book Review Notable Books of the Year: Long-listed

2022, New Yorker Best Books of the Year: Long-listed

2022, New York Magazine Best Books of the Year: Long-listed

2022, Esquire Magazine Best Books of the Year: Long-listed

loved it

strongly connected with the father daughter narrative, and felt an incisive mind was collecting thoughts. felt didactic and myopic at times though

Enlightening for Some, Tedious for Others

Sheila Heti manages to tell the story of the life of an incredibly average woman and find deep spiritual and philosophical meaning in her mundanity. This book isn’t for everyone, and it isn’t even really for me. It felt very much like a “stream of consciousness” as another review put it. A lot of ideas about life and god and love are explored, and anyone who is interested in those things and can read a more abstract novel would likely enjoy this.
There were a couple moment during the listen that made me wince. One was about halfway through when Mira’s father dies and his soul enters her being. The author describes this transition as….an ejaculation?? She does this not only once but multiple times in different ways, but somehow the word ejaculation is used at least 4 times throughout a shockingly short period of time. She even says she feels the warmth like…you know. Now I’m not a prude but I just have to ask myself why this was a deliberate choice Heti made, maybe I’m not seeing it the way she intended. There are other instances of very sexual analogies being made despite the book being entirely non sexual, so I wonder if this is serving as some kind of thematic device or if it’s just provocative to grab our attention.
Overall this was a short read that tries to tackle very complex ideas in a unique format that doesn’t follow the traditional structure of storytelling. I am glad I read this although it didn’t speak to me in the ways it did other readers, that’s okay!! Sheila Heti is clearly a great writer and I look forward to seeing what she works on in the future

Strange but beautiful

I had to work to get into
This book but it was worth it. Thanks

Glorious

I laughed I wept I gasped I had chills, i stopped in the middle of the street to write down lines that resonated, it was a compact experience of truth and beauty that found me in a moment of fragility and made me feel stronger, thank you Sheila for sharing your beautiful soul with us.

Nothing else like it

I enjoyed every word of this spellbinding work of utter creativity. I found myself saying out loud. “How did she do this???” while listening.. She narrates very well, too! LOVED IT!

Definitely worth the listen

Very interesting, beautifully written and performed, this is a story with a strong core, one that is full of soul interspersed with tit bits of astrophysics. Though while listening to it I felt the narrative drifted a little into bazaar-land occasionally, in hindsight I think it offers a really scintillating perspective of life and everything that makes life worth living. Sheila Heti is definitely an author I'll be reading more from.

Unique book that provokes musing on loss

It seems there is a lot of literary controversy around this book but I found it a wonderful foil to think about who you are ,who your people are, who we are to our parents and us to them, what is bigger than you or god if you believe, ( I am an artists and an atheist-just saying). Some reviewers have found it simplistic, faux mystical but I found that the light or funny parts give a breather while you explore your own remembrances. I lost a sister recently and parents not long ago, much of feelings the character Mira has about attending and being present with the dying I enjoyed re-living, thinking about speculatively through this book. There's lot's of room to roam your own thoughts while listening. Maybe this is better as an audio book. The short length seemed just right.

Unusual perspective on life and fiction

Mira transforms from a timid, but highly articulated, shop-girl who is grieving her father’s death into a leaf with a cosmic perspective and philosophy about the universe. Then she renews her connection to more normal living in the most unexpected ways. This book is truly something different. The protagonist is hesitant, self-critical, loving, impulsive, and driven by intense aesthetic sensibilities. The tone is not always clear or consistent. Is she a fish, a leaf, a speck of cosmic dust, a young woman consumed by grief, regret, and the desire for connection? All of these? Her journey is simultaneously philosophically sophisticated and utterly mundane. But somehow Heti’s writing and the sensitive Audible performance capture a compelling tale of a young woman trying to tell her own cosmic story.

Colors

Loved this courageous, stream of consciousness tale. Deftly woven the warp and woof of this journey through life & death. The radiant gem of each thought. Thank you!!

Pretty & filling

Short and convenient. I was left satisfied with what was said. Beautifully said. Creative and so different. The perspective. I could relate to her love her grief her health her spirit. Glad I got a glimpse into the world this piece holds still I don't think it's for everyone. But if you do look and listen, do so with some grace as part of your judgement.