It can be somewhat exhausting to hear again how Jasmine is evaluating her inadequacy in the context of a new situation. In this case, we spend time thinking about how Jasmine doesn’t trust enough, isn’t good enough, makes stupid mistakes. On the other hand, it’s not ideal because we spend a great deal of time in the heroine’s head thinking about things. This is ideal for a slow burn, because we get to interpret all of his actions and comments, but we’re not sure until he actually acts on his feelings. Zapata writes from a first person perspective, so we have no idea what the hero is actually thinking unless he says something. But also the internal dialog of the heroines needs to be reduced by at least a third. Everything Ivan does is evaluated in the context of his being in love with Jasmine–by the reader, not by Jasmine, because of course she needs to be oblivious until the slow burn climax!Įrin: Okay, so Mariana Zapata is the slow burn queen. They start skating together and continue to antagonize each other, but eventually Ivan calls a truce and they develop a bickering besties sort of friendship. Also Jasmine’s best friend is Ivan’s younger sister, so they’ve been antagonizing each other since they were children. Jasmine hasn’t won anything since she left the junior level, so she is very confused as to why he wants to partner with her.

His family owns the ice complex where they train. He’s a skating prodigy, has won all kinds of competitions, and has two gold medals. The big “R” word is looming–retirement–but she’s just not ready to stop skating.Įnter Ivan Lukov, who for some inexplicable reason asks to partner with Jasmine for one year. She has a learning disability and has no interest in college (skating is life!), but she’s also a pairs skater who has been without a partner for a year.

Spending time with the Santos family again was so sweet. A good slow burn can be very satisfying, so I decided to risk raging about another pair of lovers and picked up From Lukov with Love, which is about the sister of Ruby, the heroine of Dear Aaron. Ingrid: Um, she puts the slow in slow burn.īut here’s the thing…I actually enjoyed the suspense of the slow burn in Dear Aaron. Plot: Pairs figure skating team antagonizes each other into a HEAĮrin: For real, Ingrid, why does Mariana Zapata write such crazy long books?

From love with lukov