Review: Inseparable by Siobhan Davis

A gritty, angsty, friends-to-lovers standalone romance from USA Today bestselling author Siobhan Davis.

A childhood promise. An unbreakable bond. One tragic event that shatters everything.

It all started with the boys next door…

Devin and Ayden were my best friends. We were practically joined at the hip since age two. When we were kids, we thought we were invincible, inseparable, that nothing or no one could come between us.

But we were wrong.

Everything turned to crap our senior year of high school.

Devin was turning into a clone of his deadbeat lowlife father—fighting, getting wasted, and screwing his way through every girl in town. I’d been hiding a secret crush on him for years. Afraid to tell him how I felt in case I ruined everything. So, I kept quiet and slowly watched him self-destruct with a constant ache in my heart.

Where Devin was all brooding darkness, Ayden was the shining light. Our star quarterback with the bright future whom everyone loved. But something wasn’t right. He was so guarded, and he wouldn’t let me in.

When Devin publicly shamed me, Ayden took my side, and our awesome-threesome bond was severed. The split was devastating. The heartbreak inevitable.

Ayden and I moved on with our lives, but the pain never lessened, and Devin was never far from our thoughts.

Until it all came to a head in college, and one eventful night changed everything.

Now, I’ve lost the two people who matter more to me than life itself. Nothing will ever be the same again.

A standalone new adult contemporary romance with a happy ending. Only suitable for readers aged eighteen and older due to mature content and possible triggers.

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Siobahn Davis is one of my favorite authors but this book destroyed me. It was a riveting story with excellent characters but part of me will never forgive her for writing this because this book hurts. I adored Condemned to Love and the Rydeville Elite series, but she broke my heart with Inseparable. Rydeville Elite was relentlessly cruel to the characters and while I felt for them, it didn’t have such drastic effects as Inseparable, maybe because it was too wild to be real. In contrast, this story was all too real. I haven’t picked up another book since finishing it because I’m still trying to come to terms with this story.

It’s a testament to Davis’ mad skills that I could feel so strongly about these characters so I’m seriously impressed but still upset. If I want to be sad, I’ll read the news or watch one of those commercials with the Sarah McLachlan songs playing over video of abused dogs. I don’t want to be sad, which is why I’ve never seen Bambi or read Marley & Me. My style is more Billy Madison and Helena Hunting.

This book has a HEA ending which usually means it’s safe but the middle crushed me and despite being pleased with the ending, I still wish most of the middle didn’t happen. Every time I thought it couldn’t get worse, it got worse. To be fair, I couldn’t put it down though and read the entire thing in under 24 hours. This one’s addictive. It moved me and shocked me and made my emotions go wild. It’s worth mentioning that the last book to make me emotional was Jackson, which is also by Davis.

This is the story of three lifelong friends who’ve grown up as neighbors: Angelina, Devin and Ayden. Things start to get complicated when they’re teenagers and what was once the perfect friendship ends in heartbreak for all three, but probably not the way you’re expecting. It’s part love triangle, part friends to lovers, part enemies to lovers. There’s so much happening and so many layers to this story, but I can’t get into any of that without spoiling everything. I was sure I knew where this story was going at first and while I was right about a few things, the game change about halfway through will make your head spin then she tosses in another one at the end for good measure and I never saw either one coming.

This is told mostly from Angelina’s POV and a bit from Devin’s also. That works perfectly because the story wouldn’t be as strong with just a single POV. I don’t recall anything taking place from Ayden’s POV but this book wound me up so much I honestly could be overlooking it, although I don’t think so. Usually I’d object to a book not giving enough weight to a main character’s POV but in this case, it was the right move because nobody ever knows what Ayden’s thinking and that drives a lot of the action.

There were times early on when I got so frustrated with the characters and had to remind myself they’re in high school. Of course, they’ll be shallow and self-centered and shortsighted because we all are at that age. I loved Angelina initially, despite her faults, but I got really angry with her in the middle and couldn’t move past it completely. The irony is, she carries immense guilt but she’s mad at herself for entirely the wrong reasons. Devin was my favorite of the three from the start. Despite his faults, he was charming and went to great lengths to protect the people he loves. His backstory is even worse than I suspected so I adored him even more.

Ayden was an enigma. He was the good boy to Devin’s bad boy, pulling excellent grades and a full ride football scholarship while Devin was drowning at the bottom of a liquor bottle and too busy chasing tail to go to school most days. Ayden seemed perfect on the surface but he had his own demons and he allowed them to take over. Angelina has been in love with Devin her entire life, until he not only rejects her but publicly humiliates her. His behavior detonates his friendship with the others, while Angelina and Ayden eventually start dating. Things seem perfect at first but the new roles soon destroys their relationship.

By the time Angelina starts college the following year, the friendship has fractured, possibly irreparably. Things begin to improve when she mends fences with one of the guys, but the other goes nuclear and nothing will ever be the same. This was the first time I didn’t think it could get any worse, but then Angelina does the unthinkable and it was almost like reading a completely different story. I couldn’t have been more shocked and disappointed in the author if aliens had invaded, I swear. This was so out of left field and I understand why she did it and even concede that she did it extremely well but I don’t like it at all.

This is when I began to hate Angelina but as things gradually improve, I started to hate Ayden even more. It’s a long, sad trip but once everyone’s secrets and truths come to light, it’s a whole different ballgame. They’ve suffered so much and while they made awful decisions that hurt everyone, they were kids and they were falling apart. Ultimately, they’re all absolved because they punished themselves more than anyone else ever could, but I still can’t entirely forgive them. The ending had two more twists that I never saw coming, one smallish and one huge so I was impressed.

While I concede this is a HEA ending, I’d qualify it by specifying that it was the happiest possible ending under the circumstances but I wish things had been different. This is an absolutely epic story of love and life and loss and redemption but be prepared for this book to break your heart.