SIGHH. situationship + hopeless romantic. perfect combo.

It was corny and creepy, kinda love story with a pinch of mystery. the characters are mostly Vietnamese or Korean, which added some interesting cultural background to the story but the highlight is lion dancing. Here in Indonesia we call it barongsai and through this book I just knew that there's also a Korean version of lion dance with different a different "lion" appearance. I was going to give this 3-3,5 stars but the ending touched my heart so 4 stars it is.

Valentina adores Valentines day...or she did until she found out her family secret and now she's convinced that she, like everyone in her family, is cursed to have no luck with love... but then she meets a pair of cute lion dancers... and one of them could be the real love that would help her break her family curse, but which one is it? Val grew up loving Valentines day but when she finds out her family secret about her mother she begins to hate it. Val's little secret is that she use to have an imaginary friend that was a cupid.. but after the day she discovered the truth about her mom and her family she believes she is cursed and now has to find real love in order to break it. Cue, two lion dancers, both cousins, and only one of them is her real love. Now Val has to go through the various pains of trying to figure out what love is, what real love is and how she can heal from her family's secrets as well as figure out what her own heart wants. This was such a unique story and I really loved the focus on Vietnamese culture in it. It just felt like a really heartfelt read and I loved getting to see Val's journey with healing and finding peace again.

*Thanks Netgalley and First Second Books, First Second for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review*