Luna and the Lie: ★ ★ ★ ★ . 7 5

Mariana Zapata

“You got that little fox on you, but you’re a wolf, baby. A fucking miracle.”

The slow burn queen has honestly ruined romance for me in the absolute best way. I don’t think anyone will ever do it for me anymore, because she is the standard.

Luna Allen has secrets hidden in her chest—about her family, her past, and what brought her to CCC, where she does paint jobs on cars. But despite the unbelievably rough past she’s had, she’s nothing but sweetness and sunshine in a human body. An absolute angel whose positivity was so potent and honestly made me rethink how I live my life because I need to be more like her.

There’s no doubt Mariana Zapata does grumpy/sunshine unlike anyone else in the entire world, but Lucas Ripley? The textbook example of grumpy. Like seriously. Oh my god.

Rip is so fucking hot I literally think I might collapse if I think about him for too long because holy— The protectiveness, the possessiveness, the sweet, sweet man that he is deep inside for Luna and only Luna. He cooks, he keeps his house clean, he won’t leave Luna alone when she’s afraid. He’s literally perfect.

Mariana Zapata served us some of the best groveling I’ve ever read. The way Rip would do anything to “get his goddamn Luna back” was just precious—the flowers, the cake, the donuts. And the one bed trope in this? Y’ALL. PLEASE. MY COLD DEAD HEART.

I’m not even kidding when I say every moment of physical contact and every dropped “baby girl” made my heart beat so fast and my face pull into the widest grin.

Luna & Rip have my whole entire heart. They are such a fortifying strength for one another and despite all the secrets, lies, and things that have broken them down in the past, they come together in the most beautiful way.

Mariana Zapata is consistently one of my favorite authors and there’s no way she’ll ever lose that throne. I am helplessly, wholeheartedly obsessed with her and every single bone in my body is devoted to her supremacy.

Ok, I know this author is known for the slow burn and I completely went in know this. I loved Luna, her love for her sister’s shines through and she needs them because of her family past. But I don’t think they fully understand what she lived with if they did they might not have been the way they were.

Now for the heart of the matter, this is listed as a romance so where was the chemistry? I get the slow burn but there was no burning. Luna had a one-sided affection that she never showed hardly even in her head.
I was waiting and waiting for the long looks the tension the chemistry we get it at the very, very, end when it was too little too late.
I liked the characters overall but I also felt like this book was way too long, let’s be honest if something anything happened it would have been exciting. ANYTHING but we got like 1 thing and all the eluding to stuff and it just fell flat.

I kept with the book because I was hoping for something. And we got it at the end 17 hours, for 1 hour of the meat.

The narration was FREAKING AWESOME, this is probably why I kept with the book. I really enjoyed both narrators and will be looking for more by Gomez Pugh.

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Relistening has been the best thing I could have ever done, I liked this book and this author more and more after I relisten to the her books the second time. I loved this book.

the way I think that Mariana zapata can’t keep writing bangers…she does!!! I think what made this book amazing for me was that I could feel in my body everything that Luna was feeling. Marianas writing is so astonishingly beautiful and real. Her characters and their stories feel so real and authentic. All my love for Luna and Rip

Blah blah blah, "I was fine, I was loved" x8000. Luna is the most annoying, doormatty, passive aggressive (I use this term by the loosest of definitions) "heroine." God forbid she have even a backbone sometimes.

Rip is also awful. Like who would want to date this man? He is never even a little bit nice.

3.5 ⭐
this book made me feel so many feelings. i went in knowing nothing but him threatening her dates away and i loved everything, the grumpy x sunshine, the nickname baby girl and just them in total

i LOVE Mariana Zapata like the slowest burn ever he’s grumpy asf and i eat it up every single time!!!

Actual rating 3.5 stars

Luna's life is a mess, but she makes do and she's thankful for the job she learns to love, the loyal friends she makes along the way, the purple house she's living in, a father figure she sees like her own father, and the little sisters who love her unconditionally. She has a secret, but it's not something big like you'd imagine after reading the title. I think the only person convenienced by the secret itself is herself.

This is quite possibly the lowest rating I have ever given to Mariana Zapata's book, and not because Luna and The Lie not great, because it is. The writing, the characterization, the plot, the relationship between characters--all of them is fantastic. Mariana Zapata has never disappointed me with her ability to create a nice romantic slow burn and development of the characters.

However, there is just this one tiny problem that I have: Luna's personality.

Now, I think I've mentioned before that my reviews are subjective. I've also mentioned that characterization in the book matters A LOT to me, that is to say I have to somehow like the main character to get through the book. I'm not usually picky. I even like characters with flaws the most--they make them seem more human and relatable. I like anti-heroes. I love mean girls. I even like one or two snobbish characters. My point is I don't dislike many of them.

The only personality that I have never liked EVER is the spineless doormat character.

Many of you would exclaim in outrage because of what I'm saying. "Luna is not spineless! Look at how she managed to befriend the scariest motherf**ker in town." I know, I know. I am not talking about Luna specifically, I'm just saying I mostly ditch book whose main character with that type of personality, but I don't ditch this one because I believe in Mariana Zapata.

Now this is subjective for me because I prefer my girls prideful and goal-driven--like Jasmine from From Lukov With Love. It's a case of "It's not you, it's me". I loved Luna at first, but I disliked the choices she'd made throughout the book and while I can concede that she is a very nice person, I don't think we would get along well with each other if she were to be an actual person in real life. She frustrates me and I don't like being frustrated while reading fiction books is all.

Also, maybe there is this little troubling fact that she is a combination between me and my best friend in real life--but in a bad way. Luna has major difficulty of asking and accepting help and while I can see where it comes from it still frustrates me. Instead of seeing her as humble, I just see her as a stubborn woman who doesn't know when to accept other people's concern. She never quite handles that negative side of hers either, I mean at least until the bits in the last 15% of the book, but all right. Anyway, this is just me. It bothers me.

Maybe this one is a miss for me. I still most of it, especially Lily that precious little angel, but I like Luna the least from other characters of Mariana Zapata.

Maybe next time.