Author’s Notes

6200 words

Random House owns the rights to characters from the Trixie Belden series. I am receiving no profit from writing this story, although I hope its intended audience will enjoy it!

This story is set in the 1980s, an era of over-the-top clothing styles. Princess Diana (Prince William’s mother, not Diana Lynch) set the tone with her fairytale wedding in July, 1981. Big, poufy sleeves, full-skirted ballgowns, big hair, and sweetly feminine styles by Laura Ashley and Gunne Sax emulated Diana’s early style. Leg warmers a la Jennifer Beals in Flashdance, pastel and color-block sweaters, high-waisted, full-cut pleated jeans... more 80s glory! Undergarments worn on the outside, a la Madonna, didn't become a universal look. But there's a time and a place for every clothing style, and Diana Lynch (in my story) wanted the more casual look such as Molly Ringwald wore in The Breakfast Club, not the lace-trimmed, wide-sashed dresses her mom favored. See a selection of 80s clothing for girls above if you're having any problems remembering... and I won't admit responsibility for any bad 80s dreams!

Thank you to our lovely and creative CWE team, Vivian, MaryC, and Deanna (cestmoi1). True Colors is a submission for CWE #20: Finishing Unfinished Trixe Business. Read Vivian’s beginning: Violet Hazel.

I chose the title True Colors for my conclusion for several reasons. It seemed to honor Vivian’s color-tinted title and was also emblematic of the 80s, during which time I felt like Vivian’s piece naturally fell (I had originally wanted to set it in my own universe, but no eighth-grade girl in 1969 would have carried a backpack, as her Diana did). The following lines of Cyndi Lauper’s iconic 1986 hit seemed perfectly suited to Diana Lynch at the time the story begins:

You with the sad eyes
Don't be discouraged, oh I realize
It's hard to take courage
In a world full of people
You can lose sight of it all
The darkness inside you
Can make you feel so small

In addition, during the story I felt like Honey Wheeler and the fake Uncle Monty both showed their true colors. Thank you to my daughter, Andrea, for suggesting it.

Copyright 2019 by MaryN. Background created by me in Photoshop Elements. Banner graphic made using the eyes from the models for Diana and Honey from my Cast Pages: Emily Rudd as Diana and Chloe Grace Moretz as Honey. They’re used without permission but I’m making no profit from their appearance, either.