What is Colour?
In the isolated valley of Wetledale, conformity is absolute. Under the strict regime of Attitudinal Science, colour is contraband, and life is governed by a monochrome bureaucracy. A veteran Transporter, his livelihood stifled by these rules, smuggles a disgraced Examiner across the mountains to expose the leadership’s hypocrisy. But they are not alone. Helen, a young decorator with a dangerous affinity for the forbidden hues, unearths secrets that the Council has striven to conceal.
When their attempt to use the rules to free the valley is crushed by ruthless political maneuvering, the Transporter and Helen are forced into a desperate alliance. No longer fighting for the truth, they embark on a final mission: to smuggle a cloth of vibrant, revolutionary colour to a neighbouring land, hoping to ignite a change abroad that Wetledale is too afraid to embrace at home.
92,000
Adult
Themes Explored in Colour
- Truth, Perception, and Deception
- Authority, Control, and Power Dynamics
- Individual Agency vs. Systemic Constraints
- Journey and Escape
Synopsis
Beyond the Last Mountains, in the stark, colour-drained valley of Wetledale, the dominance of the monochrome cabinet-making industry has stifled all other trades. A Transporter, his livelihood ruined by this new order, enters a conspiracy to restore the old trade routes. He smuggles a disgraced but brilliant Examiner, Jim Kirwin, into Wetledale during the harsh winter, catching the powerful Cabinet Makers' Fraternity off-guard.
The plan is immediately complicated by the Peacekeeper, a ruthless political operator from the Southern City. She is intent on controlling Wetledale's wealth and halting the flow of 'Fishwick colour' - a vibrant dye fuelling the rise of the Sky Lord in the neighbouring Flatlands. While the Examiner investigates, the Transporter finds an unexpected ally in Helen, a young decorator who feels an intense, suppressed connection to colour. Guided by the Transporter, Helen unearths a magnificent, colourful mural hidden behind the panelling of the Conformance Hall, proving that Wetledale's monochrome history is a lie.
Helen, aided by her pragmatic cousin Angela and the enigmatic forager Michael Fishwick, secures secret records detailing the illegal use of colour by the very leaders who forbid it. This discovery triggers a violent siege at Fishwick's cottage and a desperate flight across the treacherous marshes.
Although the Transporter rescues the group, the Peacekeeper intervenes at the Armdale warehouse. In a crushing act of realpolitik, she prioritises economic stability over justice. She quashes the Examiner's findings, forcing a broken Kirwin to file a sanitised report that preserves the status quo in exchange for a comfortable retirement.
Facing total defeat, Helen makes a final plea to the Transporter. She refuses to let the truth fade back into grey. Moved by her conviction and his own rediscovered belief in the necessity of risk, the Transporter makes a fateful choice. He agrees to help Helen smuggle a cloth of the shimmering Fishwick colour across the border to the Flatlands, choosing to ignite a revolution abroad rather than submit to control at home.
Portrait of Colour
Excerpt: The Transporter in Wetledale
The Transporter halted his cart where the track began its steep descent into Wetledale. The mist still sat in wisps over fields that edged the river as it flowed along the valley floor. Even though the mist had nearly lifted, everything the Transporter could see beneath him remained grey, white, brown, or occasionally, the blood red of rust.
Wetledale was the most northerly of the seven valleys that made up the Seven Valleys Region. The Transporter was one of the few who could cross the mountains into Wetledale in the winter. He had crossed the Last Mountains that morning in the dark, with the wind sweeping in from the sea beyond the end of the valley. Even at this advanced autumn time of year, a heavy cloak could not keep the cold out of his limbs.
From the Transporter's vantage point, it was clear that Wetledale had undergone a significant transformation. While this change may have been good for a resident of the valley, it certainly was not good for a Transporter.
Questions and Answers
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How does the narrative structure of Colour mirror the artistic process?
Much like a water colour painting, the story is applied in 'transparent layers.' It is a non-linear journey that shifts between the high-stakes present and the historical betrayals of the Southern City. By layering the perspectives of the weary Transporter, the idealistic Helen, and the pragmatic Examiner, the reader experiences a slow-burn revelation where the 'truth' of Wetledale only becomes clear once every wash of narrative has been applied.
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What makes the 'Colour Trinity' a unique allegorical tool in dystopian fiction?
Beyond mere aesthetics, colour is the novel's magic system and its political weapon. The conflict between Additive light (the Sky Lord's hope) and Subtractive pigment (the Council's control) serves as a sophisticated allegory for political theory. It pits the 'light' of individual potential against the 'gravity' of institutional control, where the regime believes that any deviation from the established 'brown' of conformity leads to societal collapse.
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How does Colour subvert the traditional 'chosen one' trope?
Revolution in Wetledale does not come from a warrior, but from a 'Colourer' - a young decorator named Helen whose rebellion is her ability to perceive. The story explores the intersection of her youthful radicalism with the 'Transporter's' veteran pragmatism. It is a dual-protagonist arc where change is sparked not by a sword, but by the retrieval of a hidden record and the courage to see past a state-mandated monochrome.
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How is 'colour' used as theme and metaphor through the narrative?
The novel contrasts two philosophies of colour, representing two opposing political/philosophical structures.
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1. Additive Colour (Red, Green, Blue): The Sky Lord's claim that these "purest colours" combine to form white light. This represents the possibility of a new, optimistic, and unbound future.
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2. Subtractive Colour (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow): The traditional Flatlands model, which combines to create black or the earth-tone brown of the Cabinet Makers. This represents the older, controlling order where everything must ultimately be blended into the established, non-divisive structure.
Colour is used throughout the novel not only as a physical element (pigments, dyes) but extensively as a central theme and analogy for concepts of power, emotion, morality, social structure, and reality itself.
Colour - by Anthony Riding
Anthony Riding is a debut novelist whose work explores the intersection of systemic control and individual expression. With advanced degrees in both Science and Business Management - including a specialised focus on the psychology of Creativity - Anthony spent a career in international marketing and innovation across Europe and Southern China.
This background in the culture of organisations and the nature of global trade provides the foundational realism for the world of Colour. Having spent decades navigating the high-stakes communication of international boardrooms, Anthony brings a unique perspective to the 'realpolitik' of his speculative worlds.
A writer since the age of ten, Anthony lives and works in the heart of the UK's literary tradition, just two miles from Shakespeare's Birthplace in Stratford-upon-Avon.
Colour is the culmination of his fascination with how systems of power attempt to 'conform' the human spirit, and the vibrant resilience required to resist them.
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