Editorial Content for Pick a Color
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Reviewer (text)
If you've ever wondered if the service professionals for whom English is not their first language are talking about you, they probably are. Or at least that's the case if PICK A COLOR, Souvankham Thammavongsa's debut novel set on a single day in a nail salon, is to be believed.
The salon is called Susan's, and every employee wears nametags that read "Susan," even though they all have their own names in Vietnamese. The owner, Ning, barely thinks of herself by that name anymore: "I've been here so long my old name feels like it belongs to someone else."
"Careful readers will marvel at how much is revealed despite the book’s slim length and its protagonist's deliberate self-distancing..."
But Ning does have a name and a history that predates her time at Susan's. She's in her early 40s now, but years earlier, she was a promising boxer whose career ended when she put another fighter in a coma. Adrift and without other professional options, she was offered a job at a different nail salon and never looked back. Except, of course, she does look back despite herself, as her first-person narration reveals.
By design, Ning maintains a high level of emotional distance from her clients and employees --- and even, some may argue, from herself. She concerns herself with the mundane tasks of running a small business: ensuring the sandwich board is set up on the sidewalk, refilling supplies, drumming up walk-in customers, filling shifts when employees call in sick or just disappear.
But Ning’s cracks start to show every once in a while, such as when she allows her mind to wander to her past --- full of darkness that readers only glimpse --- or when her employees grant her an unexpected kindness, like bringing her lunch: "I don't want them to know I wanted this. I don't tell them thanks. I don't tell them I want anything. I was hungry. And they thought of me."
At times, Ning's extreme emotional reserve can make her narration feel distanced or even chilly, so readers must do some (eventually rewarding) work to look beyond the surface at how things are said, or what remains unsaid. PICK A COLOR is also surprisingly funny, especially in the women's interactions with one another and their commentary on their clients.
What shines through, despite her detachment, is the extent to which Ning relies on this work and these women for her sense of self. Careful readers will marvel at how much is revealed despite the book’s slim length and its protagonist's deliberate self-distancing: "I like the distance," she insists, "and the thinking I do from there." Ning's enigmatic story will prompt plenty of thinking in readers as well.
Teaser
Ning is a retired boxer, but to the customers who visit her nail salon, she is just another worker named Susan. However, beneath this superficial veneer, Ning is a woman of rigorous intellect and profound complexity. A woman enthralled by the intricacy and rhythms of her work, but also haunted by memories of paths not taken and opportunities lost. A woman navigating the complex power dynamics among her fellow Susans, whose greatest fears and desires lie just behind the gossip they exchange. As the day's work grinds on, the friction between Ning's two identities --- as anonymous manicurist and brilliant observer of her own circumstances --- will gather electric and crackling force, and at last demand a reckoning with the way the world of privilege looks at a woman like Ning.
Promo
Ning is a retired boxer, but to the customers who visit her nail salon, she is just another worker named Susan. However, beneath this superficial veneer, Ning is a woman of rigorous intellect and profound complexity. A woman enthralled by the intricacy and rhythms of her work, but also haunted by memories of paths not taken and opportunities lost. A woman navigating the complex power dynamics among her fellow Susans, whose greatest fears and desires lie just behind the gossip they exchange. As the day's work grinds on, the friction between Ning's two identities --- as anonymous manicurist and brilliant observer of her own circumstances --- will gather electric and crackling force, and at last demand a reckoning with the way the world of privilege looks at a woman like Ning.
About the Book
From Giller Prize and O. Henry Award winner Souvankham Thammavongsa comes a revelatory novel about loneliness, love, labor and class, an intimate and sharply written book following a nail salon owner as she toils away for the privileged clients who don't even know her true name.
“I live in a world of Susans. I got name tags for everyone who works at this nail salon, and on every one is printed the name 'Susan.'"
Ning is a retired boxer, but to the customers who visit her nail salon, she is just another worker named Susan. On this summer's day, much like any other, the Susans buff and clip and polish and tweeze. They listen and smile and nod. But beneath this superficial veneer, Ning is a woman of rigorous intellect and profound complexity. A woman enthralled by the intricacy and rhythms of her work, but also haunted by memories of paths not taken and opportunities lost. A woman navigating the complex power dynamics among her fellow Susans, whose greatest fears and desires lie just behind the gossip they exchange.
As the day's work grinds on, the friction between Ning's two identities --- as anonymous manicurist and brilliant observer of her own circumstances --- will gather electric and crackling force, and at last demand a reckoning with the way the world of privilege looks at a woman like Ning.
Told over a single day with razor-sharp precision and wit, PICK A COLOR confirms Souvankham Thammavongsa's place as literature's premier chronicler of the immigrant experience, in its myriad, complex and slyly subversive forms.
Audiobook available, read by Zoe Doyle
