2.18.2025 | Tuesday

Twice in a Blue Moon

Item: Twice in a Blue Moon
Rating: 4
Author: Kim

category: Book Reviews
tag(s): adult
0 Comments

title: Twice in a Blue Moon
author: Christina Lauren
published: 10.22.2019
publisher: Gallery Books
genre(s): romance
pages: 351
source: library
format: hardcover
buy/shelve it: Amazon | B&N | Kobo | BookBub | BookHype | Goodreads

rating:

the blurb

Sam Brandis was Tate Jones’s first: Her first love. Her first everything. Including her first heartbreak.
During a whirlwind two-week vacation abroad, Sam and Tate fell for each other in only the way that first loves do: sharing all of their hopes, dreams, and deepest secrets along the way. Sam was the first, and only, person that Tate—the long-lost daughter of one of the world’s biggest film stars—ever revealed her identity to. So when it became clear her trust was misplaced, her world shattered for good.
Fourteen years later, Tate, now an up-and-coming actress, only thinks about her first love every once in a blue moon. When she steps onto the set of her first big break, he’s the last person she expects to see. Yet here Sam is, the same charming, confident man she knew, but even more alluring than she remembered. Forced to confront the man who betrayed her, Tate must ask herself if it’s possible to do the wrong thing for the right reason… and whether “once in a lifetime” can come around twice.
With Christina Lauren’s signature “beautifully written and remarkably compelling” (Sarah J. Maas, New York Times bestselling author) prose and perfect for fans of Emily Giffin and Jennifer Weiner, Twice in a Blue Moon is an unforgettable and moving novel of young love and second chances.
From the New York Times bestselling author of The Unhoneymooners and the “delectable, moving” (Entertainment Weekly) My Favorite Half-Night Stand comes a modern love story about what happens when your first love reenters your life when you least expect it…

a few notes
my review
the good & the bad

POV: 1st person
keywords/phrases: betrayal, first love, family dysfunction, acting
tropes: second chance, enemies to lovers
spice: 🔥🔥🔥🔥
language: 🤬🤬🤬🤬

read this if… you love romances with lots of drama and emotional moments.

the good

The story of Roberta and Luther.
Charlie as the protective BFF.

the bad

Tate’s father and their relationship.
The lack of snarky/quirky humor which is a signature of the authors’ books.

This read very different from the other books I’ve read by these authors. It was much more serious, without the signature snark and quirky humor of their usual books. And while I appreciated and enjoyed the more intense feel, I missed the snark. I think there could have been room for both with this story.

I love a second-chance story, the way two people come back together. And not every second-chance has to come after angsty events, but when it does, there needs to be a deep acknowledgment of whatever those events might have been. There was acknowledgment, but it definitely didn’t feel as explored between the characters as it should have been. It felt like their reunion was just too easy.

Another aspect that bothered me was the relationship between Tate and her father. I hated the way he treated her, and I hated even more her acceptance of it. She felt like a doormat, never calling him out for his behavior, not once. No matter what he did, she justified it, excused it. It felt uncomfortable, how easily she accepted it.

But I did love the chemistry between Sam and Tate. I felt his guilt, even if Tate didn’t make him work harder for forgiveness. And I loved the intensity of the film they worked on together, the script Sam wrote. That was the story that needed to be told.

About Christina Lauren

Christina Lauren is the combined pen name of long-time writing partners/best friends Christina Hobbs and Lauren Billings. The coauthor duo writes both Young Adult and Adult Fiction, and together has produced seventeen New York Times bestselling novels. Their books have been translated into 30+ languages. (Some of these books have kissing. Some of these books have A LOT of kissing.)