The Backtrack

De: Erin La Rosa

Narrado por: Mela Lee

Life, rewound…

Nearly twenty years ago, Sam Leto left her small hometown of Tybee Island, Georgia, to pursue her dreams of becoming a pilot. While she’d prefer to keep flying away from her painful childhood memories, her beloved grandmother Pearl decides it’s time to sell the family home. Reluctantly, Sam is summoned back to pack up the house.

The 2000s nostalgia from Sam’s old bedroom hits immediately: Fall Out Boy posters, drawers of roll-on body glitter and even her favorite CD player with a mixtape from her best friend, Damon Rocha. Damon was always a safe place and Sam often wonders what if her teenage self admitted her feelings for him back then…

Mysteriously, the CD player still works all these years later. And somehow it has the power to show Sam an alternate version of her life.

Song by song, Sam receives flashbacks from her past—senior prom, graduation, leaving home. But the memories aren’t as she remembers them; they show what could have been. Suddenly, Sam knows exactly what would have happened if she’d taken a chance with Damon—and she can’t help feeling she made a terrible mistake leaving Tybee all those years ago.

"A perfectly in-tune love story that will be playing on repeat in my mind for a very long time." —Lauren Kung Jessen, author of Red String Theory and Lunar Love
"La Rosa shines at genuinely funny and feminist romantic tales, and I'll read every single one of them." —Amy Spalding, bestselling author of For Her Consideration

FOR FANS OF:

• Millennial nostalgia
• Magical realism
• Friends to lovers
• Dual timeline
• Second chances
• Found family
• Beachy small town

Don't miss Erin La Rosa's next delightful rom-com, NOT YOU AGAIN, where a snarky screenwriter and a grumpy funeral director must must team up to escape a time loop—despite their mutual loathing and undeniable chemistry...

So cute!!

I really enjoyed this book!!! The narrator was a little too wispy for me but still good!
Lots of healing in this book and loved the ending!!

What if?

Loved the book. It proves how doing one thing different can change the entire outcome.

Sam and Damon’s Magical Playlist- 5 Stars!

This has got to be a favorite from La Rosa for me. As an all too cynical, self proclaimed “realist” who generally has trouble suspending disbelief and enjoying fantastical fiction, The Backtrack is *the* exception.

From the start, La Rosa’s wit and humor shines through in Sam. Unlike many heroines who end up falling way too far on one end of the naive to know-it-all scale, Sam’s character is multi dimensional and layered, like real women are. She is relatable and lovable and you find yourself rooting for her up until the last page.

Without going too deep into any spoilers, “alt-Sam”, who Sam is able to unexpectedly reconnect with when on an unwanted hometown visit, is the muse that all young women need to recognize and learn from- themselves. Rather than a stereotypical second chance romance, where other characters and situations help the MC see how far she’s come, Sam is her own muse. And how perfectly poetic is that?

Damon is swoon-worthy. Grandma Pearl is who we all deserve as a mentor. All of La Rosa’s side characters flush out into helpful muses that enrich Sam’s story, rather than detract from her inner growth.

Lastly, as a musician, La Rosa’s accurate depiction of songs that helped shaped many elder millennial emo hearts pack a punch of flavor that takes this story from lovable to irresistible. The songs on Sam and Damon’s Magical playlist will not only take me back to the moment in time where I heard them for the first time, but it’ll take me back to their love and how much I adored it.

* * * * * - 5 Stars