ARC Review: Never Always Sometimes




Title: Never Always Sometimes
Author: Adi Alsaid
Series: N/A, Standalong
Genre: Young Adult, Romance, Contemporary
Publication Date: August 4th, 2015
My Rating: 4.5 Stars

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. 

  I was given an ARC by the publisher through Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. Note that all quote mentioned here were taken from the ARC copy, not the final version.

  Oh wow, this book is amazing! I didn't think that I would like this book when I started reading it since it felt kind of boring to me. I mean, I enjoyed the writing and the actual conversations, but in terms of the story, nothing was happening at first. But after I finished the last page of this book, all that was in my mind was "Wow!" over and over again.


"A little better than you found it." "The Best you can ever do is to leave the world a little better than you found it."

  Never Always Sometimes' story is brilliant, just brilliant! I am now convinced of how amazing Adi Alsaid is! You know, if this plot had been transferred to another book in another writing style, I am almost certain that I would hate every moment of it (I won't say more about what happened because it's a spoiler). But with Adi Alsaid, the way he walked me through the story, everything felt like a new discovery - a way of learning about oneself and others. The way it was written was just amazing, and it had a way of forcing me to love it even if I didn't think I would at first.


"We like to think that we're formulas that even out exactly, that we are perfect matches with each other. But we're not. We match up with lost of people, more or less."

  The plot of this book was brilliant in such a way that all the "turning around" (I have no idea how to say it in English, but in Tagalog, it's "pasikot-sikot) had a point. That is the main reason why I didn't hate this book - not one bit. It's one thing to think of a plot like this one, it's another to be able to execute it well, and Adi Alsaid did both! 

  One of my favorite things from this book was how the title and the cover made sense. I always love learning about why a book is called such, and if I see part or the whole title inside the story. But in this one, the words weren't said together; they were mentioned separately and they just made so much sense.


"There was no greater proof of an underlying connection than the universal hatred of Monday mornings."

  The ending of this book was the perfect closing of the book, which I can only say for really, really few books. It made me smile so much to the point that my cheeks were already hurting. At first I was only going to give this book 4 stars, but as I was writing my review I realized just how much I loved the book, so I'm bumping it now to 4.5 stars.

  I definitely recommend this book, and I look forward to reading more of Adi Alsaid's books! I haven't read his debut novel yet though, so for the mean time I have that to read while I patiently wait for his next book.


4.5 amazing stars!



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