What do readers think of Lima Nights by Marie Arana? Write your own review.

Although I enjoyed this book, I thought it promised more than it delivered. The author had a canvass on which she could have developed her characters, their backgrounds, the motivations for their actions much more acutely than she did. It is a story of passion, but we never understand why Carlos has the passion he does. It is a story of loss, but we never understand why the characters are willing to lose as much as they do. It was well-written and an easy story in which to become absorbed, but it left me feeling that the author didn't want to explore a depth of her characters, which made it a good book, but not a great one.

The reader is swiftly pulled into a deep and reckless passion difficult to put down. Desperation and desire make for strange bedfellows. A vast confusion of emotions fuels the story forward. Just as one comes to grips with the consequences of the characters hungriness, Arana unravels everything at full tilt leaving a sense of puzzlement at what was all along obvious but blatantly overlooked while devouring the book.

In Maria's words, the two main characters are like a chicken and a goose--too
different to ever truly understand each other.

Although some readers may be drawn to the title for the promise of an exotic variation on Lolita, and for the drama inherent in this unlikely pairing, this is less a story about romance than it is a story about consequences and inevitability.

I enjoyed the first half much more than the second half. The second half wavers:
the combination of voodoo, misunderstandings stopping just short of the feverish
pitch reached in the film The War of the Roses, and an attempted suicide scene may strain believability. There's a sense that, for all we've read about the main
characters, we haven't come to know them well enough to truly understand them.
Maria's past, with its difficulties, is implied as the reason for her present-day
desire for security, but it may come across as too simplistic.

Still, the book is recommended for fans of Maria Arana's previous book American Chica. Lima Nights explores similar themes from another angle, such as the duality present in the city, from the guarded streets of the wealthy to the corrugated rooftops in the shanty towns. The ability to navigate these social worlds with a clear, accomplished writing style made this a compelling enough book to read in one sitting.

I had high expectations for this novel. It started out with interesting characters and an intriguing setting in Lima, but the storyline petered out along the way. I was also disappointed with the ending, as it seemed trite.

Lima Nights draws you in with colorful descriptions of Peruvian nightlife and the excitement and eroticism of a new, forbidden relationship.
As author Maria Arana introduces Carlos and Maria and their extended friends and family to the reader, the story is artfully drawn; the emotions and circumstances compel empathy for the characters. Still, the relationship is complicated and at every chapter the reader weighs the decisions Carlos makes as the love affair grows—this is the best of the author’s gifts and would be fabulous fuel for a book club.

However, while beautifully detailed and empathetic at the start, Lima Nights, ultimately loses the crispness of the story telling as the novel draws to its close and rather than wanting more, the reader is simply relieved the story is over.

With a trip to Peru planned for the coming summer I was excited about the prospect of learning more about Lima and it's night life, however, I expected more from this book than it delivered. While the author paints a story rich in imagery and easy to envision, the characters are neglected and the reader is carried along on the age-old premise that Latin men continue to have families on the homefront while entertaining their sexual needs in the city. The idea becomes tiresome as four friends meet occasionally to lament their situation, without any real details for the reader.

A two part story, part one of the book is where we get to learn the most about what brings Carlos and Maria together. This part reads quickly and with a hint of promise. Yet part two quickly jumps 20 years into the future and we only get brief glimpses of what has become of Carlos and Maria during the 20 year span. In fact, it's hard to believe that their relationship even lasts that long, as dull as the story paints their situation to be. The promise of nightlife in Lima and an exotic love affair never came through and in the end the characters are superficial, never truly developed

Despite the promise of an erotic love story, I felt somewhat detached from the story of Carlos and his mistress Maria.

Because their personalities weren't well developed, they remained characters in a book, not people whose lives I could become involved in and care about . The story seemed to be an age old one of Latin American men being hot blooded and needing to feed their sexual appetite and yet this time Carlos went too far, destroying his entire family. The author wrote about voodoos and hexes which enlivened the plot, and the ending had an unexpected twist, but over all, I felt it lacked passion.

I really had to work to force myself to finish this book. It had some interesting and exciting parts, but overall, I was not engaged in the story. I did not find any of the characters likable and was not satisfied with the ending.