Review: Never Always Sometimes by Adi Alsaid

Never date your best friend

Always be original

Sometimes rules are meant to be broken

Best friends Dave and Julia were determined to never be cliché high school kids—the ones who sit at the same lunch table every day, dissecting the drama from homeroom and plotting their campaigns for prom king and queen. They even wrote their own Never List of everything they vowed they'd never, ever do in high school.

Some of the rules have been easy to follow, like #5, never die your hair a color of the rainbow, or #7, never hook up with a teacher. But Dave has a secret: he's broken rule #8, never pine silently after someone for the entirety of high school. It's either that or break rule #10, never date your best friend. Dave has loved Julia for as long as he can remember.

Julia is beautiful, wild and impetuous. So when she suggests they do every Never on the list, Dave is happy to play along. He even dyes his hair an unfortunate shade of green. It starts as a joke, but then a funny thing happens: Dave and Julia discover that by skipping the clichés, they've actually been missing out on high school. And maybe even on love.

Shona's review 4 of 5 stars

I had heard many good things about this book and I jumped at the chance to read it when I came across it on Netgalley. I am more than a little sad to admit that it fell a little short of my expectations. Don't get me wrong, I found it very enjoyable and I read it in just two sittings (would have been one but I really had to sleep), I was just left with a sense of being underwhelmed by the ending....

I loved Julia as we saw her from Dave's POV, I found myself loving her a little too. Her carefree way in which she traversed not just high school but her life. But as the story progressed and we got see from Julia's POV I realised she wasn't quite as carefree as she made herself look and by the end of the book I felt incredibly sorry for her.

Dave who cold never seem to make up his mind where his attractions lay began to really annoy me. Yeah sure I could understand why he would try and begin a relationship with someone who wasn't Julia, but he constantly seemed to be sat on the fence wanting to the with the person he wasn't with. And I wont say any more on that matter due to spoilers... Read the damn book already.

Am I the only one who was reading this and wondering where all the parents where at? Dave's dad makes a somewhat appearance, and I've heard it be said that parents tend to be easier on boys because well because they're boys. But Julia has two dads..... where were the dads questioning why she was travelling to San Francisco and where was she staying, and when would she be home, and why did it have to be a on a school night....

This book sounds like it will be a fun easy to read book and it is, but its also deeper than that. There are several more serious situations that the book touches on, albeit briefly, but they are there, adding an extra layer of depth. This book will have you travelling back to your own high school days (or comparing them to your current high school days) and nodding in agreement at certain aspects. It will stir up feelings and memories that you thought maybe you had buried. It will have you feeling like Dave and Julia. And that's not a bad thing.