The Colours

a captivating, epic historical drama about family, love and loss

By: Juliet Bates

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Hardcover | 9 April 2020 | Edition Number 1

At a Glance

Hardcover
384 Pages

Dimensions(cm)
3.5 x 19.2 x 40.4

Hardcover

RRP $45.00

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An atmospheric, intense novel of the bond between mother and son, set against the backdrop of the world wars.

Ellen sees the world differently from everyone else, but living in a tiny town in the north-east of England, in a world on the cusp of war, no one has time for an orphaned girl who seems a little strange. When she is taken in to look after a rich, elderly widow all seems to be going better, despite the musty curtains and her aging employer completely out of touch with the world.

But pregnancy out of wedlock spoils all this, and Ellen is unable to cope. How will Jack, her son, survive - alone in the world as his mother was? Can they eventually find their way back to each other?

The Colours is a sweeping novel of how we can lose ourselves, and our loved ones, for fans of Kate Atkinson and Virginia Baily.

About the Author

Juliet Bates was born in the north-east of England. After studying art and art history, she has worked as a lecturer in art schools in the UK and now in France. The Colours is Juliet's second novel; her debut, The Missing, was published by Linen Press in 2009, and her short stories have appeared in British and Canadian journals and magazines.

Industry Reviews

Juliet Bates studied art and art history and there is a delightful observational delicacy to her prose, a careful cataloguing of the everchanging shades of the waves and the vivid red of the 'clarty' sand of Teesby, where the novel is set. It's a quality that perfectly befits the two main characters . . . Theirs is a story of illness, estrangement and misunderstanding * Daily Mail *
This gently-paced, carefully crafted, totally engaging epic family drama spans nearly seventy years and takes in some of the major events of the 20th century . . . Bates explores the complex mother-son relationship at the centre of the novel with great sensitivity and empathy. The misunderstandings, the sense of loss and longing and the absence which haunts both their lives, are very convincingly and poignantly portrayed. And it is all played out in the picturesque landscape of the North Yorkshire coast, described by Bates in lyrical and affectionate detail * Yorkshire Post *
The Colours is a sweeping family drama covering a span of several decades of the 20th century from just before the First World War right up to the Royal Wedding of Charles and Diana in 1981. The imagery and descriptions in the novel are striking, closely observed and beautifully wrought -- Yvette Huddleston * Yorkshire Post *

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