Anna is a writer, author of one very successful novel, who now keeps four notebooks. In one with a black cover she reviews the African experience of her earlier years. In a red one records her political life, her disillusionment with Communism. In a yellow one she writes a novel in which the heroine relives part of her own experience. And in a blue one she keeps a personal diary. Finally, in love with an American writer, threatened with insanity, Anna tries to bring the threads of all four books together in a golden notebook.