Lege et Lacrima by Alina Comsa Review

 

* This review is spoiler-free *

4.5/5 ⭐

Tropes

➮ Small-town romance

➮ Chosen family

➮ Strangers to lovers

➮ Dual POV

➮ Instalove

Synopsis

When Lalah finds her boyfriend in bed with another woman, she knows she has to absolutely change her life. After years of being a nomad, Lalah settles in the town of Lost Hope.  After a snowstorm, Cole and his family end up on her doorstep. The knight in shining tattoos brings his two step sisters with him as they begin to warm her heart once again. Cole makes fighting Lalah's demons his new mission. 

Best Quote From the Book

“Reading was my escape, my safe place, my protective cocoon."

LGBTQ+ Representation

2/5 🌈

Cole's little brother Blake is bisexual. This is briefly mentioned in the story and is totally accepted. Blake is not properly out at the time of the book but it is implied he has some sort of relationship with a man. 

Cole is totally supportive and is simply happy if Blake is happy. The reason this rating is not higher is because that part of his character was set up as if more would be done with it but it simply never happens. Blake does not have a book of his own planned but it does seem like things were set up with that possibility in mind. Until he gets to properly explore his bisexuality, this rating will not be higher. 

My Thoughts

When I discovered that Lalah is a reader girlie, I started to love her character. She is confident and knows what she wants. A lot of what she wants is to read in peace and avoid people. I find that dream highly relatable. When she creates her dream house, I want to steal it. I will gladly take that state-of-the-art security system and that beautiful giant library. I'm pretty sure anyone reading this review would also love that.

This book seems like it is trying a bit too hard to set up the plot and establish the characters for the entirety of the rest of the series. As a result, trying to learn about every single character relevant to the town is a lot for readers to process. It's okay to not know the characters in book five all the way from book one. Readers are confronted with a lot of backstories and a spider web of relationships to shift through. Even in a small town, not every person in town will be connected to one another directly. I would've loved to see the web built out over the course of the series instead of being aggressively peppered in throughout the first book. 

I was shocked to see how happy I was with Lalah and Cole's instalove attitude. It was quite funny during many different moments. Including the extreme caveman energy of many of the guys in town. 

Admittedly I don't really get the heavy inclusion of Latin in the story. It threw me off a bit initially because I've never seen another story employ Latin in that way. 

This book in total is over 500 pages. Surprisingly I don't think those pages were wasted. The entire book was truly filled with plot and character-building. That said, I would've loved to see it trimmed down at least 100 pages. Perhaps that is mostly due to my short attention span. 

The found and thrown-together family works incredibly well together. I love seeing the girls interact, Blake's funny moments, and how naturally Lalah lets Cole's family into her life. It truly seems like they were all destined to have a life as a family. They chose each other and supported one another in a very powerful way. 

Please do keep in mind this book does have a decent amount of spice. It would be difficult to skip so I do not recommend this book to those not interested in or uncomfortable with spice. In addition, please review the trigger warnings before diving into this book because it does cover some heavier topics. 

Overall I quite enjoyed reading this story. The fond family, funny bonds, and host of solid characters make it stand out. Going forward, I hope the rest of the series is slower to introduce new characters.

I received this book as part of an arc team. My review is honest and voluntary