Mood Indigo

by Mandy Sayer

From the 1989 Australian/Vogel Literary Award Winner comes an immediately engaging novel-in-stories, written in a deceptively simple style. It tells the story of Rose, three or four years old as the novel opens, a teenager as it ends.Rose loves the beach, her sister, her mother. Most of all, she loves her Dad, and Dad's music. But too few people want to hear him, and sometimes Rose and Wanda and Mum have to fit uncomfortably into other people's lives.Mandy Sayer uncovers the powerlessness of a child with an entirely steady hand. Her social observations are often bleak, yet she draws the reader into a deep and lasting involvement with all her characters, and especially with the feisty, irrestibile Rose."

Genres: Australia

Paperback

First published January 1, 1988

About the author

Mandy Sayer is an award-winning novelist and non-fiction writer. Her most recent book, Australian Gypsies: Their Secret History, has just been published by New South Press.

Reviews

[Chris Waterford · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mandy Sayer is easy to read and her honest (I assume autobiographical) writing is appealing. Her characters and dialogue are very real and interesting and enjoyable.
7.5/10

[Marianne Webb · Rating 2 out of 5]

Australian writer but too depressing for me to enjoy it

[Sam Gieck · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are many personal reasons why I should have connected with this book. Being a Western Sydney-sider definitely increased my engagement with the tale, as I am familiar with many of the places mentioned throughout. Living in an area with a fairly dense housing commission occupancy also heightened my investment in the well-being of the primary characters. Further, I am a pianist and work in multicultural music education, meaning that the musical themes throughout the book held particular appeal for me. Despite all of that, I did not find the book very involving.

For me, an excellent read needs to have the sort of characterisation that makes characters seem to occupy a space outside of the personal imagination. And while I certainly saw a lot of the choices characters make, I never really got to know them. Except, perhaps, Rose's mother and sister (and only then because of the biases I bring in to understanding such characters). In fact, I felt I knew every character better than the main one. While I was grief-stricken for Rose's situation, I felt a distance from her throughout. I never felt I had any insight into her choices which, despite being a child, she did make. I respected her strength, daring and never-failing patience, but her seeming lack of response to her mother's bad choices resulted in a character that lacked realism and lustre.

SPOILER BELOW

Overall, the best aspect of the book was the picture of poverty. I kept expecting the story to get better, in the cliched way that an outsider will come in and save the day. When the teacher character came along I thought, 'this is it, she's going to get fostered and everything will be alright'. Of course, this doesn't happen. And things continue down the road of (relative) poverty until the end. Taking this realistic approach was brave, and I really enjoyed seeing the lesson that's not often shown. Sometimes, things don't necessarily get better and "things like that just happen".

[Felicity Waterford · Rating 4 out of 5]

Evocative depiction of a young girl growing up in 60s 70s Sydney. Whether she walking past the iconic fountain at Kings Cross or sipping an orchy on an old train through the Western suburbs, the language told a story about Rose and her adored pianist father and her opportunistic mother.