I received an Advance Listening Copy of this book thanks to the publisher and Libro.fm. All opinions are my own.
When I read Thammavongsa’s debut short story collection in 2021, I finished by saying that I would look forward to a novel from her. So when I saw an audiobook version of her first novel on Libro.fm, I eagerly snagged a copy.
Pick a Colour takes place over a single day in a nail salon. Our narrator, Ning, is the owner of “Susan’s”, a business she prides on running as efficiently as possible, getting customers “in and out, in and out”. She and the other employees are nearly identical to their clients, all with the same haircuts and outfits, each wearing a nametag that reads “Susan”. Ning and her employees gossip and discuss their clients in their own language while buffing, polishing, and pampering. They are funny, biting, and sometimes crude. They act subservient to whoever’s in the chair but Ning knows that they are in charge.
Ning is a former boxer, someone who is used to her body being used and abused. She is observant and fiercely independent, keeping those around her at arm’s length, refusing to join her employees when they go out for lunch, even when she wants to join them. At the same time, we see flashes of tenderness – the drawing she keeps in a drawer that were done by the children of an employee who stopped showing up, the moment she invites an unhoused man into the salon and gives him a haircut for free.
There is a lot of good writing here but my overall impression was that the story wasn’t quite…finished. Why are we here with Ning on this day? Where is the tension? There’s some from the fact of an angry customer who might return but that never really feels like a danger. And there’s a scene right at the end of the book that I felt like was supposed to be a lot more meaningful than it came across to me. Has anything changed for Ning at the end of this day? I’m not sure I believe it has.
What I enjoyed most in Pick a Colour was the glimpse behind the scenes of a world I know very little about. Thammavongsa does an excellent job of depicting the sliding power differential that exists in such a business, where the customer might always be “right” but the employee holds the physical power over them.
Karissa Reads Books 
I was so curious about this one when I saw it was shortlisted for the Giller. This woman has Giller prize running through her veins! haha
I don’t often go to nail salons, but I do enjoy a pedicure once or twice a year so I’ve always been curious about the dynamic of the staff there. It makes sense that there is this shifting power dynamic, and the fact that this salon owner is a former boxer is a very cool little addition.
I did not realize until just now that I need a nail salon book in my life. I totally know that experience of how the employees look similar, how they talk to each other (typically in Vietnamese, I think), and how I know nothing about their lives. This might not be the right book, but I do want a book about nail salons. Heck, maybe even how the owner bought the salon, got employees, and lead up to modern day, like the first customer coming in the door—and then THE END would be cool.
It really does capture that atmosphere very well. A specific language is never mentioned in the book but I did assume the characters were speaking Vietnamese. We get a little bit of the history of the main character and how she ended up owning and running her own salon and I enjoyed that stuff. It did NOT make me want to go out and get my nails done!
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