Pure Colour

By: Sheila Heti

Narrated by: Sheila Heti

“True and newly alive.”—Los Angeles Times

“One-of-a-kind. . . . nothing less than vital.”—The Guardian

A new novel about art, love, death and time from the author of Motherhood and How Should A Person Be?

Named a most anticipated book of 2022 by The Globe and Mail ● CBC ● Esquire ● Entertainment Weekly ● BuzzFeed ● Publishers Weekly ● Vulture ● and many more

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, a woman named Mira leaves home for school. 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 she enters the strange and dizzying dimension that true loss opens up.

Pure Colour tells the story of a life, from beginning to end. It is a galaxy of a novel: explosive, celestially bright, huge, and streaked with beauty. It is a contemporary bible, an atlas of feeling, and a shape-shifting epic. Sheila Heti is a philosopher of modern experience, and she has reimagined what a book can hold.

©2022 Sheila Heti (P)2022 Knopf Canada

Critic reviews

2022, Governor General's Literary Awards, Winner

2022, Scotiabank Giller Prize, Long-listed

The Universe did WHAT?

I'm so disappointed. This is one of my favourite BookTuber's favourite books, and I honestly hated it (okay, not actually, I'd give it 2.5 stars).

This book is all vibes, no plot. It contains a lot of philosophical musing, but to be honest I didn't find any of it to be particularly compelling. It relies too heavily on its own internal logic, which the author explains at the beginning of the book (people are divided into three "types": fish, birds, and bears) but the whole time I was reading it, I kept thinking, "But that's just, like, your opinion, man." 🤷‍♀️

Additionally, the author may not have been the best choice for narrator; her voice is clear and bright, but she "uptalks" the entire time, which I think is supposed to lend a sense of innocence and wonder to the narration, but to me it gave the distinct impression of a talkative child telling you a long, meandering story with no clear point or conclusion. The audiobook was only 3 hours long (shorter, in fact, because I usually listen to audiobooks at between 1.3x and 1.5x speed), and it felt absolutely INTERMINABLE. It genuinely took me three days to finish because I didn't feel compelled to continue, and every time the narrator paused, I prayed the credits would roll... and inevitably, they did not. It just kept GOING.

I hate writing negative reviews, especially since this book seems pretty popular, but I just don't get the hype. Maybe I'm too dumb to get it. Maybe I would have enjoyed it better if I were stoned.

If you don't mind books that are all vibes, no plot, then you'll probably love this book. The writing style is unique and the concepts are kind of neat. I'd consider revisiting it at some point, either reading a physical copy or simply popping an edible before listening to the audiobook again.

(On second thought, if I never hear the phrase, "The Universe ejaculated her father into her" again, it'll be TOO. SOON.)