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A review by evavstheworld
From Lukov with Love by Mariana Zapata
slow-paced
3.0
3 stars.
I finally finished this and I'm very frustrated, and I realise I have such a love/hate relationship with this book...
On the one hand, I loved, absolutely <b>loved</b> Ivan and Jasmine, and the way their relationship evolved from <i>enemies</i> to <i>friends</i> to <i>best friends</i> to wayyyy more. And I know their love language/expressing affection for one another is basically insulting each other, I can get behind that <b>only</b> because at one point it does kind of become <i>their thing</i>, and it was natural given their strong characters and mutual hate for each other from the very beginning. I also loved reading about their practice, and I wish there was more of that in the book, as well as more of the actual tournament.
Now for the reasons this book makes me mad.
First of all, I can totally see where Elena Armas took her writing inspo from because the writing styles of MZ and EA feel almost exactly the same. <s>I just enjoyed this book a lot more than TSLD.</s>
There was:
- way too much repetition (how many times can someone say a character blinked? or how many times can the character say "no" and the other character tell them to do the thing anyway???)
- too much monologue... ffs this was a CHORE to read, to the point where I just skipped chunks of text and legit felt like I didn't miss anything... bet if this was edited better and cut down, the page count would go from 500 to around 350 easy
- not enough tournament and skiing content
- not enough Jasmine's friendship with Karina content!!! I wanted so much more!
- too much fat shaming, plus the nickname Meatball when Jasmine is literally battling body dysmorphia/body image issues was so unnecessary???
I think giving this 3 stars is still quite generous, but as I've mentioned TSLD before, which got 2 stars and which I enjoyed significantly less, I think it's a fair rating given my reasons for loving/hating this book. I fell head over heels for Ivan Lukov though, despite his shortcomings, but he shall forever remain one of my favourite book boyfriends.
I finally finished this and I'm very frustrated, and I realise I have such a love/hate relationship with this book...
On the one hand, I loved, absolutely <b>loved</b> Ivan and Jasmine, and the way their relationship evolved from <i>enemies</i> to <i>friends</i> to <i>best friends</i> to wayyyy more. And I know their love language/expressing affection for one another is basically insulting each other, I can get behind that <b>only</b> because at one point it does kind of become <i>their thing</i>, and it was natural given their strong characters and mutual hate for each other from the very beginning. I also loved reading about their practice, and I wish there was more of that in the book, as well as more of the actual tournament.
Now for the reasons this book makes me mad.
First of all, I can totally see where Elena Armas took her writing inspo from because the writing styles of MZ and EA feel almost exactly the same. <s>I just enjoyed this book a lot more than TSLD.</s>
There was:
- way too much repetition (how many times can someone say a character blinked? or how many times can the character say "no" and the other character tell them to do the thing anyway???)
- too much monologue... ffs this was a CHORE to read, to the point where I just skipped chunks of text and legit felt like I didn't miss anything... bet if this was edited better and cut down, the page count would go from 500 to around 350 easy
- not enough tournament and skiing content
- not enough Jasmine's friendship with Karina content!!! I wanted so much more!
- too much fat shaming, plus the nickname Meatball when Jasmine is literally battling body dysmorphia/body image issues was so unnecessary???
I think giving this 3 stars is still quite generous, but as I've mentioned TSLD before, which got 2 stars and which I enjoyed significantly less, I think it's a fair rating given my reasons for loving/hating this book. I fell head over heels for Ivan Lukov though, despite his shortcomings, but he shall forever remain one of my favourite book boyfriends.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Body shaming, Bullying, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual harassment, Car accident, and Fatphobia