Danzy Senna has rightly gained a reputation as a novelist grappling effectively with issues of race and identity, particularly how they intersect with contemporary work and relationships. Past novels (as well as her memoir) have taken different approaches to this topic. In COLORED TELEVISION, Senna takes a largely satirical approach that will resonate with readers and writers alike.

Jane, a biracial novelist and untenured college professor, has spent the last decade of her writing life obsessed with producing an epic novel, “a mulatto WAR AND PEACE” that spans centuries to explore biracial identity in the United States. Jane’s husband, a Black visual artist who’s currently obsessed with preparing for an upcoming exhibition in Japan, is blithely (or perhaps stubbornly) unconcerned with commercial success.

"COLORED TELEVISION manages to be both suspenseful and funny, caustic and hilarious in its humor. Above all else, Senna is showing off the power of her observational humor..."

As a result, the two have spent several years, ever since they relocated from New York City to Los Angeles, moving from short-term stay to short-term stay, housesitting for their better-off friends and colleagues since they’ve all but given up on finding a permanent home of their own. This existence doesn’t seem to bother Lenny much, but it has started to grate on Jane, who grew up in a somewhat unstable home and fears providing the same for their two children, Ruby and Finn.

For the past several months, Jane has managed to maintain the fantasy that she’s living out the aspirational lifestyle she once imagined when she saw a beautiful biracial family depicted in the Hanna Andersson catalog. Their family is currently housesitting for one of Jane’s former classmates, Brett, who abandoned his own one-time literary aspirations to become a successful Hollywood screenwriter for zombie shows. The house is gorgeous, with space for both Jane and Lenny to work on their art. So is it any wonder that when Jane, finally done with her novel, gets some devastating feedback from her agent and editor, she picks up Brett’s agent’s card and gives her a call?

Jane is both wildly excited and mildly embarrassed when the Hollywood agent contact results in a seemingly productive meeting with powerful Black producer Hampton Ford, who (conveniently) has been tasked with developing diverse content for the studio. Lenny, in particular, rolls his eyes at the man he dubs “Lincoln Perry,” after the actor who played the old-time racist caricature Stepin Fetchit. But Jane --- having been seduced entirely by Brett’s lifestyle and career path --- pauses only a moment before pitching Hampton what is essentially Brett’s idea: a sitcom about a biracial family, one perhaps similar to Jane’s own but funnier. When Hampton bites, Jane starts to see dollar signs. But her appropriation of Brett’s contacts and ideas is only the beginning of her ethical lapses, topped only by those of Hampton himself.

COLORED TELEVISION manages to be both suspenseful and funny, caustic and hilarious in its humor. Above all else, Senna is showing off the power of her observational humor, which she employs to comment on the life of the writer, the current state of academia, the rise of interracial relationships, the allure of Hollywood, the social milieu of Los Angeles, and the pressure of parenting, all of which get swirled up together in Jane’s mind and her story: “Rich women got to pay somebody else to be them --- a stunt double to make it look like they were doing everything well when, in fact, they were doing only the fun parts.”

It’s no wonder, perhaps, that Jane views Hollywood as the quickest route to realizing her aspirations. But as her morality is tested again and again, readers will be rooting for her to pursue a more authentic, if less picture-perfect, future.