Journey Into Color

By: Robert Williams

It’s 1964, and the civil rights movement is in full swing. Mike Martino, an aspiring writer born in a small New England town, heads out to Los Angeles, California, to write a novel about his experience as a singer. He drifts in and out of casual sex relationships, afraid of becoming tied down – that is, until he meets Mae Kelly, a young black woman with a difficult past of prostitution, poverty, drugs, and jail. But through it all, she has maintained an innocent, child-like purity that captivates Mike and makes him succumb to her special “It” quality. But this is the 1960s in America, and Mike is white and Mae is black. Their love story plays out against the backdrop of racism and long-held prejudices, which even Mike cannot fully escape, no matter how hard he tries.

Written in common vernacular and influenced by the author’s own experiences, Journey Into Color is a bohemian romance with an edge – and, ultimately, a story of hope for a better future.