the brown is like a muted brown.  Kind of like brown with a touch of gray.  My sister in law has these boots, so I knew exactly what I was getting before I ordered and I was not at all disappointed. I ordered these in an 8, which what I always wear.  Sometimes I wear a 7.5 but never larger than an 8.  I definitely could have gone with an 8.5 for these though.  So the 8's run a tad small, and if you want to be able to wear thick socks, you'll need an 8.5.  I have found that the only thing I can wear with them is fleece lined tights.  These do keep my feet nice and warm though so I won't dock points for that.  The boot is wide enough to fit my calves (14 inches), plus skinny jeans tucked in.  I saw someone else said they were heavy, but they aren't heavy to me at all.  I have lots of boots though, so I'm used to how a boot is supposed to feel.  The only little complaint is that the ankle area where you stick your foot in to the actual shoe part of these, is a bit narrow.  Not a big deal for me though because instead of it taking me 2 seconds to slip these on, it takes like 4 seconds lol.  No boot is 100% perfect, but as far as synthetic material boots go, these are awesome!