Undone by Peyton Corinne: My Book Review

My Review of Undone

If you’re looking for an angsty, emotional college hockey series filled with characters dealing with their own trauma, look no further than Peyton Corinne’s Undone series.

I was so excited for Toren’s story, having gotten glimpses of him throughout the previous books. There was always this sense that there was so much more going on beneath the surface. I wanted to finally understand him, but more than anything, I wanted to see this guy get his happily ever after which is why I had such high expectations going into this book.

And wow, does Undone start strong.

The very beginning scene immediately made my heart hurt for Toren. He’s truly alone in the world and so broken emotionally and physically that when Coach Harris and his wife find him hurt and bloody and bring him into their home, you desperately want him to finally believe that someone could care about him without wanting something in return.

Unfortunately, things don’t get much easier.

He’s the outcast on yet a new hockey team, and now his former coach and abuser, Coach LaBlanc, is back in his life and using his position to push Toren and his teammate Holden beyond acceptable limits.

But LaBlanc’s arrival also brings Lily back into Toren’s life after four years apart.

And Lily’s story is just as tragic.

As her circumstances are slowly revealed, we see a young woman living under the control of an emotionally abusive father, trapped in an engagement she doesn’t want and struggling with severe depression. Honestly, I shudder to think where her life might have gone if Toren hadn’t come back into it.

Toren and Lily really do feel like two soulmates who lost each other. They grew up without the support systems most people take for granted (him in foster care and her with an emotionally distance and abusive father who kept her isolated), and so they lack the ability to even know how to make friends and how to let other people into their lives. Yet, despite four years apart, it’s obvious that they never stopped being each other’s person.

I loved that aspect of their story. What didn’t work as well for me was how long it took the story itself to move forward.

For roughly the first 70%, their relationship gets stuck in a repetitive push-pull. Toren and Lily cross paths, one rushes to the other’s rescue or they have a moment that makes you think they’re finally going to move forward, only for it to end once again with some version of “stay away from me” or “I can’t do this.”

I understood why they were doing it. These are two deeply hurt people who have spent years believing things about themselves and each other that aren’t true. But after a while, I needed each encounter to reveal something new or noticeably move their relationship forward, and instead I felt like I was waiting for the rest of their story to begin.

And when Lily finally does decide to go after what she wants, the sudden verbal clarity she has felt out of character to me. This is a woman who has struggled throughout the entire book, and really throughout her life, to advocate for herself. Up to this point, she had many moments of being unable to get off the couch, disassociating for periods of time,  and unable to be verbal in any coherent way. So this turning point to come from her and in such an articulate way with such introspection did not feel consistent with her character at all.

Things finally start moving in the last third, and some of what I’d been waiting for does come together. But I still wanted more from some of the relationships surrounding them, particularly Toren’s relationship with Coach Harris and his wife.

They literally find Toren at one of his lowest points, bring him to the university and give him a place in their home. Mrs. Harris especially tries to reach him, but Toren doesn’t know how to accept that kind of care and keeps them at a distance. That was heartbreaking, and I kept waiting for that relationship to become a bigger part of his healing.

Instead, it stays mostly in the background until the very end, when Toren finally seems able to believe that their love for him is real. I liked getting that moment, but after everything established at the beginning, I wanted so much more of that relationship throughout the book.

I also wanted more accountability for Coach LaBlanc. After everything he does to both Toren and Lily, I didn’t find the resolution to his storyline nearly as satisfying as I wanted it to be.

And given the severity of Lily’s depression, I was surprised that getting her professional help wasn’t explored more substantially. Her mental health is such a significant part of her story that I wanted that aspect of her future to receive more attention.

And I don’t need a romance to wrap every issue up in a nice little bow because that’s not real life, and I think that’s actually something Peyton does really well throughout this series. These characters deal with real issues that don’t simply disappear because you’ve reached the last page. I just wish some of those issues had been explored more deeply here because I think it would have made Toren and Lily’s story that much richer rather than putting so much of the focus on whether they would finally find their way back to each other.

That’s ultimately where Undone left me conflicted. Toren and Lily’s story is tragic, and I absolutely believed in them as two people who had always belonged together and somehow found their way back to each other.

I just wish the journey had been paced differently and some of the relationships and issues surrounding them had been given more room to develop. There was so much here that could have made this the five-star finale I was hoping Toren would get.

I received an advance reader copy. All opinions are my own.

More Books by Peyton Corinne:

• Unloved by Peyton Corinne
• Unbound by Peyton Corinne

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