{"id":41491,"date":"2025-08-18T09:16:39","date_gmt":"2025-08-18T15:16:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theprairiesbookreview.com\/?p=41491"},"modified":"2025-08-18T09:16:39","modified_gmt":"2025-08-18T15:16:39","slug":"luka-los-angeles-quakes-hockey-series-2-by-alisa-jean","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theprairiesbookreview.com\/?p=41491","title":{"rendered":"Luka (Los Angeles Quakes Hockey Series, #2) by Alisa Jean"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Equal parts heat and heart.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In her second Los Angeles Quakes novel, Jean delivers a powerful story of scars, strength, and love\u2019s ability to mend what\u2019s broken. Once the dazzling golden boy of the L.A. Quakes, Luka Ribi\u010d is left scarred and spiraling after a brutal on-ice injury. His recovery isn\u2019t just physical but deeply psychological, as he wrestles with panic attacks, insomnia, and the fear that he\u2019s becoming the very darkness he\u2019s spent his life running from. Liliana Alvarez is the last woman willing to tolerate his self-pity, and the first to see beyond his scars. What begins in conflict turns into a chance at love\u2014but only if they can survive the ghosts chasing them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Their early encounters bristle with conflict, but Jean allows tension and confrontation to ripen into trust. Grounded in vulnerability rather than fantasy, their romance develops slowly. Both characters grapple with the idea of being defined by their wounds\u2014Luka by his visible disfigurement and Liliana by the shadows of her past relationship. The story keeps circling one central question: do our scars break us, or do they shape who we can become?&nbsp; Hockey provides more than a backdrop. Its brutal hits and fleeting moments of grace mirror Luka\u2019s struggles both on the ice and in love.&nbsp; His recovery on the ice is as tentative and vulnerable as learning to love again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The prose is both fast-paced and deeply felt, sliding from playful team banter to striking intimacy. Luka\u2019s Slovenian roots and Liliana\u2019s fiery bilingual voice bring cultural weight, and the split narrative\u2014one voice steeped in despair, the other in determination\u2014keeps the story moving with vibrant balance\u2014create a rhythm that feels balanced and alive. Through Liliana, Jean explores the theme of service: the belief that healing often comes from turning outward and giving to others.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Ultimately, the novel is both an enemies-to-lovers romance and a story about scars, both visible and invisible, and the courage to let someone else touch them. It delivers the adrenaline of hockey and the heat of romance, but what remains is tenderness\u2014the story of two broken people daring to believe they deserve more than survival. Readers who loved The Deal by Elle Kennedy and Consider Me by Becka Mack will find much to admire in this sports romance.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A gritty, heartfelt hockey romance that balances passion, pain, and healing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-paragraph\"><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Luka-Los-Angeles-Quakes-Hockey\/dp\/B0DZ4QNP6T\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Buy now<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-paragraph\">Pub date April 17, 2025<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-paragraph\">C J Bahr<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-paragraph\">ISBN 979-8224713288<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-paragraph\">Price $14.99 (USD) Paperback, $5.99 Kindle edition<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Equal parts heat and heart. In her second Los Angeles Quakes novel, Jean delivers a powerful story of scars, strength, and love\u2019s ability to mend what\u2019s broken. Once the dazzling golden boy of the L.A. Quakes, Luka Ribi\u010d is left scarred and spiraling after a brutal on-ice injury. His recovery isn\u2019t just physical but deeply psychological, as he wrestles with panic attacks, insomnia, and the fear that he\u2019s becoming the very darkness he\u2019s spent his [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":145610851,"featured_media":41493,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_seo_schema_type":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_wpcom_ai_launchpad_first_post":false,"_jetpack_hide_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_featured_image_duplicate_dismissed":0,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"{title}\n\n{excerpt}\n\n{url}","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[],"tags":[723770223,723770614,7223,91,3328,178,1136176,723769804,723769803,723769805,1473,1008073,856121,309,8154,723770396,723770612,349],"class_list":["post-41491","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-723770223","tag-alisa-jean","tag-author","tag-blogging","tag-book-reviews","tag-books","tag-indie-books","tag-kindle","tag-kobo","tag-nook","tag-reading","tag-review-blog","tag-review-website","tag-reviews","tag-romance","tag-sports-drama","tag-sports-romance","tag-writing"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pajKJn-aNd","amp_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/theprairiesbookreview.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/luka.jpg?fit=279%2C445&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theprairiesbookreview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41491","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theprairiesbookreview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theprairiesbookreview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theprairiesbookreview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/145610851"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theprairiesbookreview.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=41491"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/theprairiesbookreview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41491\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41498,"href":"https:\/\/theprairiesbookreview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41491\/revisions\/41498"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theprairiesbookreview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/41493"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theprairiesbookreview.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=41491"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theprairiesbookreview.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=41491"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theprairiesbookreview.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=41491"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}