Book Description
A dazzling novel about the inextricable link between the personal and the political set against the decadence of Hollywood and postwar Los Angeles
As a Hungarian immigrant working as a studio hack writing monster movies in 1950s Hollywood, George Curtis must navigate the McCarthy-era studio system filled with possible communists and spies, the life of closeted men along Sunset Boulevard, and the inability of the era to cleave love from persecution and guilt. But when Madeline, a famous actress, offers George a writing residency at her estate in Malibu to work on the political writing he cares most deeply about, his world is blown open. Soon Madeline is carrying George like an ornament into a class of postwar L.A. society ordinarily hidden from men like him.
What this lifestyle hides behind, aside from the monsters on the screen, are the monsters dwelling closer to home: this bacchanalia covers a gnawing hole shelled wide by the horror of the war they thought they’d left behind and the glimpse of an atomic future. It’s here that George understands he can never escape his past as György, the queer Jew who fled Budapest before the war and landed in New York, all alone, a decade prior.
Spanning from sun-drenched Los Angeles to the hidden corners of working-class New York to a virtuosic climax in the Las Vegas desert, The Future Was Color is an immaculately written exploration of postwar American decadence, reinventing the self through art, and the psychosis that lingers in a world that’s seen the bomb.
Praise For This Book
Literary Hub, A Most Anticipated TitleLGBQT Reads, A Most Anticipated Title of 2024
The Rumpus, A Most Anticipated Book of the Year
The Millions, A Most Anticipated Book of Spring
"If Fellow Travelers has you curious for more in-depth historical fiction on the McCarthy era and the lavender scare, look no further than Patrick Nathan’s new novel, set in 1950s Hollywood." —Tiernan Bertrand-Essington, Queerty
"This portrait of an artist in the making dazzles." —Publishers Weekly
"Ambitious, perspicacious, and humane." —Kirkus Reviews
"A gay Hungarian immigrant writing crappy monster movies in the McCarthy-era Hollywood studio system gets swept up by a famous actress and brought to her estate in Malibu to write what he really cares about—and realizes he can never escape his traumatic past. Sunset Boulevard is shaking." —John H. Maher, The Millions
“Patrick Nathan’s The Future Was Color is a sexy, prescient novel about the lengths an artist must go to to protect their career. It’s rare for a novel to be so emotionally gripping and intellectually rigorous, but it comes as no surprise that Nathan pulls it off. The Future Was Color is a love story; it’s a thriller; it’s an essential novel about creating art during war. This book fucks.” —Isle McElroy, author of People Collide
"Patrick Nathan's The Future Was Color is a sumptuous novel that captures the class, guilt, art, sex, and politics of 1950's Los Angeles with deft tenderness. Nathan is a master storyteller who navigates the complex world of Hollywood while exposing the darkness beneath the glittering surface. A stunning novel that illuminates an era." —Mark Haber, author of Saint Sebastian’s Abyss
“This brisk and delicious novel fearlessly tackles the vast subjects of the human impulse to make art and life in the atomic age. Heady stuff, so worth adding that The Future Was Color is among the sexiest books I’ve read. What more could any reader want?” —Rumaan Alam, author of Leave the World Behind
"Clear-sighted and terribly full of love for this doomed world, The Future Was Color is the devastating romance that America needs to recognize it needs. A tremendously beautiful novel of ending after ending in which Patrick Nathan’s elegant prose hums with quiet, precise anguish, reminiscent of Victor Serge and Ali Smith." —Mandy-Suzanne Wong, author of The Box
"Nathan's gripping historical novel reminds us of the power of art in the face of a cruel and uncaring world. This is a fiercely intelligent and serious moral work that every artist should read. I was swept up in this story and didn't want to let it go.” ––Garrard Conley, author of All the World Beside and Boy Erased
“Like the best of Andrew Holleran and Marguerite Duras, Patrick Nathan's new novel changed how I see the world through its desire, its precision, its porthole to a time and place that may otherwise have been lost. Achingly beautiful, The Future Was Color helps us confront the horrors of our own climate catastrophe by understanding how many times the world has already ended, especially for queer people. In Nathan's view, art is necessary, but the best life is one spent giving and receiving pleasure, and, through pleasure, love.” ––Joseph Osmundson, author of Virology and Grandview
