Love in Colour: A Review

 RATING: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Discover love from times long ago…

Join Bolu Babalola as she retells the most beautiful love stories from history and mythology in this stunning collection. From the homoromantic Greek myths, to magical Nigerian folktales, to the ancient stories of South Asia, Bolu brings new life to tales that truly show the vibrance and colours of love around the world.

The anthology is a step towards decolonising tropes of love and celebrates in the wildly beautiful and astonishingly diverse tales of romance and desire that already exist in so many cultures and communities.

Get lost in these mystical worlds and you will soon realise that humanity – like love – comes in technicolour.

 

Whether captured in the passion of love at first sight, or realising that self-love takes precedence over romantic connection, the characters in Babalola’s vibrant stories face up to and navigate this most complex human emotion and try to capture its intangible essence. Bolu takes a step in decolonising tropes of love and creates new stories inspired by the wildly beautiful and astonishingly diverse tales of romance and desire that already exist in so many communities and cultures. 

 

Bolu Babalola’s debut anthology is a beautiful collection of the retelling of a number of famous love stories. It retells old folktales, myths and legends, and brings them into the modern world. This anthology introduced me to new myths and legends while including some that I have loved for years. Reading them with new detail and a new vivacity that Bolu Babalola includes in her stories made me love them even more. 

 

I started following Bolu Babalola on Twitter this year and, obviously, it was through her Twitter that I was introduced to her book. Her book was also one of my best friend’s most anticipated book of the year. I am not the biggest fan of romance books, but I desperately wanted to read Love in Colour when it was released. I was drawn in by the fact that some of the stories are ones I am familiar with. When I started reading the book, I was instantly drawn into the stories. They were romantic and beautiful and were modern. Retelling the stories and adding the realities of life now made them more engaging. I am not familiar with all of the stories within the book, but I will definitely be researching them now. 

 

This book is an amazing debut to have. It is so rich and unapologetically romantic. You can tell reading the stories that Bolu Babalola is someone who is in love with the concept of love. It comes across in the retellings, they flow so beautifully and effortlessly. She pays respects to the origins of all of the stories, legends and myths whilst putting her own spin on them which enhance the beauty of the romance in them. The stories are only short, but they are overflowing with emotion and you are gripped by the characters after one page. You become invested in the love and the stories and simply do not want them to end.

 

I cannot recommend this book enough. Love stories and romance novels are never my go-to but Bolu Babalola has written an anthology that is so beautifully written that I know I will be revisiting it in the years to come. All of the stories have the women at the forefront of them and it is their own story. They feel personal, as if you are watching them unfold. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and I am so glad that I followed Bolu Babalola on Twitter this year and was introduced to this book.

Until next time, I'll continue reading with wanderlust.

📚🧳✈️🗺