Meghan O'Brien

Alice Wu is at Camp Rewind only because her therapist thinks it’ll help her overcome the social anxiety she’s battled since childhood. She’s not sure she believes that theory, but will try anything to make a real friend. A casual fling would also be nice, but she’s not holding her breath. Rosa Salazar hopes camp will be an escape from a life permanently altered. Eviscerated online for her feminist critique of a popular video game, Rosa has endured months of anonymous threats over social media, doxxing, and, worst of all, the posting of graphic, sexually explicit material stolen from her cloud storage--including a dirty video she made for an ex. Using a fake name, she enrolls in camp craving a return to a simpler time, before the shame. Alice and Rosa soon discover that at Camp Rewind, anything is possible. Even an unlikely friendship that swiftly becomes something more.

Camp Rewind

Somehow I thought of this as YA before I actually read it. It's not. Not that this is a bad thing.

Alice is suffering from social anxiety. There are a lot of socially anxious characters in books, but usually I am very disappointed by those descriptions. Not in this case. Which is great, because social anxiety is not a cute character trait, believe me. It affects you so much in your everyday life and you miss out on so much you would love to do but you're so fucking afraid, so you don't do it. Okay, stopping here, because this is not the time for personal rants.

Rosa is well-written as well and her story is so believable and heartbreaking. I could rant here as well, but I'll keep quiet.

So you might be wondering why I "only" gave three stars. The answer is simple: not enough plot. Of course there are some things happening and I enjoyed the pair's adventures at camp, but there is far too much sex in relation. It does get boring after a while and I'm never a fan of feelings developing in a second (okay, it's not that bad, but you get my point). Plus important stuff (which I will not spoil here) is totally glossed over.

It's always sad to see great characters not showing their full potential... Camp Rewind is still a nice (and hot) one time read.

Disclaimer: I received a free copy through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you.

Meghan O’Brien

Alice Wu is at Camp Rewind only because her therapist thinks it’ll help her overcome the social anxiety she’s battled since childhood. She’s not sure she believes that theory, but will try anything to make a real friend. A casual fling would also be nice, but she’s not holding her breath. Rosa Salazar hopes camp will be an escape from a life permanently altered. Eviscerated online for her feminist critique of a popular video game, Rosa has endured months of anonymous threats over social media, doxxing, and, worst of all, the posting of graphic, sexually explicit material stolen from her cloud storage—including a dirty video she made for an ex. Using a fake name, she enrolls in camp craving a return to a simpler time, before the shame. Alice and Rosa soon discover that at Camp Rewind, anything is possible. Even an unlikely friendship that swiftly becomes something more.

Jude Silberfeld

I did not expect to like this book so much. I’d really enjoyed Infinite Loop (even though I’ve no idea what it’s about, since I’m so good at forgetting, which I’ve just proven once more as I just realized I’d given 3 * so I might have to read it again soon to check) but I’d been rather disappointed with Her Best Friend's Sister. Sure, the sex scenes were hot but I never felt any connection to the characters, didn’t much care about the story (insofar as there was a story between the sex), so I was a bit wary about this one, despite the mostly raving reviews. Which is why it took me a long time to get to it. 

I was SO wrong. Yes, the sex is still steamy but there’s so much more to this novel. The depiction of social anxiety, for one, is spot on. Also, any other story where the MCs fall in love in less than 48 hours would have me groan (not in pleasure) but here I believed it. I liked the complexity of the characters, I loved secondary character Bree, I liked the pace of the story, the atmosphere etc. 

In conclusion, don’t make the same mistake, just read this book. It’s fun, it’s romantic and, yes, it’s sexy.

Camp Rewind

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