Baby, One More Time

True Colors follows Marco, a young man in Berlin on the precipice of growing up, who is unexpectedly reunited with his childhood best friend, Oskar. Marco and Oskar fell out years ago, but their families are hoping that a play they are putting on will help them rekindle their friendship. Over the course of the story, it is revealed why exactly they fell out, and the feelings they had, and may still have, for each other.

The thing with Anyta Sunday, is that if you've read one of her books, then you've read a few of them. She has a toolbox of tropes - poor communication/misconceptions, mutual pining, hidden feelings for years/since the characters met - and she definitely sticks to her favourites. All her stories have a voice, but after a while it appears to be quite a singular one.

This book is enjoyable, but I feel like I've read parts of it before. Anyta Sunday herself compared this to one of her other novels, Rock, which is one of my favourite works. There is definitely a basis for comparison here. Like Rock, there is a certain ‘quirk' that the main character has. In Rock, the main character liked to collect rocks and knew lots of facts about them and their love interest also had some sort of interest in it because of them. In True Colors, the main character likes colours, and each day and person and feeling has a colour. Their love interest also knows the code and what each colour means and incorporates this into their interactions.
It's sweet, but I've read it before.

If you like standalone M/M stories with a happy ending (because you'll always find that in Sunday's stories) and angst interwoven throughout, then you'll like this. It is definitely a fun and easy read, but I was expecting a little bit more from it.

Yes - the book is spelt True Colors, but I live in South Africa where we like the u's so I write Colours with a u (like it's meant to be).

I probably fell in love with these characters from the get-go. I'm going to the Town Hall to adopt them, anyone coming with? If we all pool our money together, we can buy McDonalds.

It was such a good read. I loved basically every scene of it, especially anything to do with Marco and Oskar (who are my babies and I love them with all my heart). I really wanted to give it a 4-and-a-half, but stupid Goodreads doesn't offer that. tumblr_nposxnAqnw1uu93c8o4_250

I love the whole friends-to-lovers trope, but it's also the worst because they're friends, which means there's the possibility of them growing up, which means they know each other, so they'll be used to each other and know everything and probably have inside jokes and touch each other like real friends do and as much as I love that, it's also the absolute worst, as it makes you slam the table or whatever is near you - please let it not be an animal - and cry out in anguish because these characters that should be together are not.

I love how Marco sees in colours like come here and let me hug you and bring Oskar as well and then I can just hug both of you 24/7. It reminded of Percy Jackson - with the titles in a specific way. It seems like Chapter Titles are either Chapter 1 and so on or like in Harry Potter - The Deathday Party and so on; but I'm also happy to find a book where the titles are different.

They live in Germany, yet I never see any indication of that other than the landmarks? Where's the language and slang?

It's all very good and well that Marco's learning to love his body and all, but he basically goes from zero to a hundred in a heartbeat, to ‘I can barely look at myself' to ‘draw me, Elena.' Not that much realistic. It takes some time to love yourself and be able to let someone else look at you in that way.

There was this confusing part in the beginning of the book where the boys were 13 and the one narrating it (Marco) used words like ‘lurched', ‘slanted' and ‘protruded'. I look after a 12 year old and she's never used any of those words – and she's smart.

I was wondering on how to pronounce Marco, as I know three ways to pronounce it:

English version – as in Marco Polo
Afrikaans version – pronounced Mar-coh
Italian version – pronounced Mar-koh
- Just wondering which pronunciation I should use. Though considering the book is set in Germany, it's probably the Afrikaans version.

So, they never speak of what happened to Marco the entire book. I was wondering and speculating and thought they would tell me and the scene would end with Marco and Oskar kissing or whatever, but I'm happy that they didn't tell us.

I love how every chapter's title is a colour.

So yes, I would definitely recommend this book to everyone! It's amazing, cute, gay, what more can you want?

Quotes:

“Two swashbuckling enemy pirates race over high seas searching for Lord Large's lost treasure. Nothing and no one can stop them except their hearts – or lack thereof.”

- I'm down for that. Anybody with me?


“Bodies – nakedness – it's nothing to be ashamed of.”

- PREACH IT – let's just print this quote out and pin it out on every wall and shop window..