Former emo kid Sam returns to her childhood city to help clean out her grandmas home. She stubbles upon her CD player and the last mixtape her childhood best friend (or was he more…) made her. When she listens she’s transported back in time to relive the moment that changed her life.

Adorable concept and fun nostalgia, id made me think of my HS best friend and all the great mix tapes he used to make me (Thanks Kevin!), might have even brought up memories of that one walk where we almost kissed 😳, but aside from the nostalgia this didn’t really have much more to offer.

If you were an emo kid in the 2000s and want to be reminded of songs from your past you might like this. However I think that’s really the only way people are really going to enjoy this one.

I still don’t understand the point of the flashbacks and do not think it was done well, it does not add to the narrative in a meaningful way. Also I could absolutely do without the playlist recap after every song listen, we know what happened we just read it in the book.

Overall a very mid book. I finished it. I probably wouldn’t have finished it if it wasn’t an ARC.

Thank you NetGalley and Harlequin Trade Publishing (Canary Street Press) for sending this book (eARC) for review consideration. All opinions are my own.

Sam and Damon were high school best friends, until one night Damon tried to kiss her. Even though Sam had a crush on Damon, she pushed him away.
“She was getting out, even if that meant she had to leave Damon behind”.
Years later, Sam is working as a pilot but has to travel back to her hometown to help move her Grandma to a senior living facility. The past finds a way back to her and nostalgia helps her find the answer to some of her biggest “whys” and “what ifs”.
Overall, I really enjoyed this story. It was a quick read with a little spice, a lot of romance and just the right amount of nostalgia for this former scene kid. It was fun hearing the old looks the characters had, while being able to compare their character growth.
And it has me turning to spotify to recreate some of my own high school playlists.

This was a cute read. I think we all wonder what it would be like if our life turned out differently. Often times though, it doesn't always pan out like we thought. This story made me cry and laugh. It's really a beautiful story. Sam and Damon compliment one another well and it's interesting to see how Sam's perspective changes as she listens to each track and sees a version where she and Damon did get together in high school. I love the nostalgia and the songs that were chosen.

✨ARC Review✨

⭐⭐⭐ for The Backtrack by Erin La Rosa

I loved the premise of this book, and all the nostalgia it evoked in me while reading it; the mentions of Twilight, mood rings, lava lamps, lip smackers and cd players definitely brought me back!

I would've liked a bigger focus on Damon and Sam's present-day relationship, as it felt we were being told about their feelings more than shown them; the alternate versions of them had a lot of story time, and their current relationship wasn't so much the focus of the story.

It was still enjoyable, and the mental health and difficult family relationships aspects were well done, though some readers should proceed with caution because there are mentions of depression and miscarriage.

It was a quick read, and while I didn't absolutely love it, I'll still check out her other books and give them a chance.

Thank you to Netgalley and Harper Collins Publishing for a copy in exchange for a review. All opinions are my own.

I thought this concept was fun, unique and had me tearing up when I didn’t expect to. La Rosa really knows how to captivate her audience and make you feel things while also making you laugh. growing up in the 2000’s, this book was very nostalgic.

The Backtrack is a second-chance romance with a magical twist. It has Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist vibes with the mixtape element and the whole book is a major throwback in the best way.

There's a lot to unpack with this story. Along with the expected romance, the plot also follows along with the goings on in Sam's family and issues with her upbringing. Themes of depression are also dealt with here. Much of the ending of the book focuses on tying up all these loose ends with the family drama and I think I could've used a little more couple time at the end instead. Damon and Sam do these fun date-like things earlier on in the book with ice cream and kites, but I wanted more of them just having fun together like that as the book progressed. The spice level was a lot lower than expected too - about a 1/5 (I expected a 3/5).


Overall, the best parts of this book are all the nostalgic things:

“Having nostalgia is romantic,” Damon insisted. “It’s the ability to never forget something you love.”

This hits SO HARD. While the music in particular is the most nostalgic part of the book, there's also references to Lisa Frank notebooks and Twilight and lava lamps. The flashbacks themselves feel like stepping into an old photograph or opening up a time capsule. The book as a whole feels like a love letter to those of us who grew up in the early aughts. (Also Fall Out Troy is a great coverband name).

I enjoyed a lot of aspects of this story, but I think it might be my least favorite Erin la Rosa so far (but ya know the others are 5 stars and I gave this one a 4 so that's definitely not to say this book is even remotely bad). I do think maybe an extra chapter or 2 with more Damon and Sam would've given me what I was looking for. Still, I definitely recommend reading this book especially if you too were an emo kid who's biggest childhood dreams were going to Warped Tour.

I’m loving the nostalgia I got from reading this. Having to relive your young adult life through Sam’s eyes was a fun experience that started with just a cd player and an almost kiss that answers Sam’s What If question she had ever since she denied that kiss in high school . I will definitely buy a physical copy just to relive this book again.

What can I even say about this book?! I’ll start with I loved to SO MUCH! It was a fun and refreshing read! The 2000s emo throwbacks made my former emo girl heart so happy, and made me feel so nostalgic. Damon is what dreams are made of, and Dam was so relatable. Plus, the magical realism and alternate timeline with the CD player kept me completely sucked in! I also loved following along on Sam’s path of navigating the feeling from her past and family struggles alongside her reunion with Damon when she returned to Tybee. I really just cannot recommend this book enough! It was the cutest!

Thank you to @netgalley and @erinlarosalit for an advance copy in exchange for my honest review!

Cute!!! It was fun & flirty but also had a lot of depth which I personally appreciated. The plot was unique & something I hadn’t read before, but it felt nostalgic (especially for teens in the early 2000s!) & hit close to home. I couldn't help but relate to Sam and the need to find herself before pursuing other things in her life.
I also thought that Erin did a beautiful job describing depression & the urge to fight or flight. Some characters did rub me the wrong way and I found it difficult to empathize with them, but I feel like that is sometimes how life goes. We don't always forgive and forget or completely understand someone's actions.
Rated 4 stars. I thought it was new and exciting. Will be recommending to follow readers and followers!

I absolutely loved this story! In a small village, a long-ago romance between best friends became lovers is given a second chance, in addition with a dash of magical time travel.

Sam returns home after a long absence to help her grandmother Pearl with housecleaning before she moves into a retirement community. In addition, she hopes to get back in touch with Damon, her former best friend. She finds her old CD player and the last mix tape Damon prepared for her—which she has never listened to—while tidying her room. Every song immerses her in a different world, showing what may have happened if she had returned Damon's kiss when they were fifteen.

Although it sounds like a really sweet rom-com from the book synopsis, I believe there are also some deeper themes included. The idea of finding your own self before sharing your life with someone else, no matter how much you love them, is also explored in the book, as is the idea of being with the right person at the wrong moment.

The main characters were fantastic! They were very lovely and relatable, and, omg, Grandma Pearl was seriously hilarious!
The way that each song tied to a plot aspect in both the other universe and the present was such a amazing idea. Fantastic selections of music!

I really enjoyed the book and can't wait to read more books from this author!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an eARC copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

To be honest, it took me awhile to get into this book. I started, and kept stopping to focus on other books/projects. Finally, I picked it back up again, and I'm so glad I did.
I was hoping from the very beginning that the 2000s, millennial, elder emo nostalgia would scratch an itch, and like I said, eventually it did, but not at first. The first 25% felt kind of flat to me, but I did binge the last 50%

I would've loved to Damon's POV and a more in depth look at Sam and his relationship as adults.

Overall, a very cute book that I enjoyed.

This is my first book from Erin La Rosa. If you are a Millennial who loved 13 going on 30, then this one is for you. This is about a girl who is trying to outrun the small town life she was afraid to get stuck in. When her Grandmother calls saying she wants to sell her childhood home but is currently injured and needs help cleaning up and cleaning out, she has no choice but to return home. On her first night there, she finds an old CD player that had a mixtape that her best friend made while they were in high school. Every time she plays a track she is taken back to see a different outcome had she chose to stay. The playlist is full of emo/punk rock that brought me back to the mid 2000s. This was a fun read.

The Backtrack by Erin La Rosa is a nostalgic love story that resonates with those who have remained loyal to their high school music tastes. This novel serves as a heartfelt tribute to both pop punk music and the relationships we often outgrow. Set against a picturesque seaside backdrop, The Backtrack offers a whimsical exploration of the question "what if." A charming and eccentric cast of characters brings the story to life, making it an irresistible read for anyone seeking a blend of romance and nostalgia.

THE BACKTRACK is a funny and charming romance set in the quaint tybee island, georgia. it's all about sam, who left her hometown as quickly as she could so she could travel the world as a pilot. but when her grandma pearl asks her to come back home so she can help her pack up her childhood home to be sold, sam finds her old CD player with a mixtape by her best friend, damon. when the nostalgia hits and sam puts her headphones on to listen, she finds herself transported back in time to 2005, where she watches what she thinks is a memory of her teenage self about to kiss damon. except, she remembers things a little differently... turns out, each track on the CD shows her a different vision of what her life might have turned out if she had kissed actually kissed him that day. as she grapples with what these visions mean, along with reconnecting with damon as adults, and unpacking her childhood home and the memories it brings (both physically and psychologically), sam wonders whether she missed her chance with damon all those years ago.

this romance had some of my favorite tropes: childhood friends to lovers, second chance, small town romance... all with a side of millennial nostalgia that had me reminiscing for the mid to late 2000s. i found sam and damon's relationship (both past and present) to be so sweet. there's just something so special about being known so deeply and for so long. along with that, i absolutely loved grandma pearl, her best friend jessie, and all the other side characters, and i found the whole family story to be really touching.

read if you like:
- emo millennials
- sassy octogenarians
- a touch of magical realism

thanks to netgalley and canary press for the advanced copy! THE BACKTRACK comes out july 16.

I was immediately grabbed by the premise for this one. I’m a sucker for magical realism and a good alternative time element - so a cd player that links to an alternative version of the early 00s? Count me in. I was also excited by the whole nostalgia factor. I wasn’t an emo kid, but the 00s were my high school years so I knew all the musical references.

While I think the premise was a great one and I enjoyed the nostalgia factor (of the 00s references to style, music, etc.), the story itself left me wanting. The premise was solid, but the first half of the story felt very slow. I didn’t really get a feel of connection between our mains, which made it hard to root for them too. It felt like a lot of telling rather than showing.

Overall, a quick read that could be read in a day. I did enjoy the references, I wish the premise had come together more. The story and characters had promise, but didn’t quite come together for me.

Thank you @netgalley for the free ARC in exchange for an honest review. I really wanted to like this book. The premise in intriguing and I’m in the right age group to love reminiscing about the early 200s. The nostalgia factor is fabulous but unfortunately it’s exactly that nostalgia that has me a bit unfulfilled. This book is an ode to pop punk, but then falls short in a couple of other key elements. The relationship between the main characters felt a bit lackluster, the spice scenes were short and a bit flat, the plot line regarding Sam and her mom felt shallow and a little too easily resolved. I’d recommend this book for anyone who does want an easy-to-speed-read walk down memory lane, complete with Hot Topic spiked belts and lots of body glitter, but it didn’t pack much of a punch besides that.

One of the less common going back in time tropes, as it's less of a stuck in a different time and more of brief flashes. In The Backtrack, we've got a possessed CD player that takes Sam Leto back in time to high school for the length of each song. With each song, she see's not her memories, but memories that could've happened, if she had kissed and then dated her best friend. However, she did not kiss him, instead she left Tybee as soon as she could and literally has never come back, until her grandmother needs her help, and her high school almost-boyfriend, well he's still there...

I really enjoyed the musical flashbacks, actually reminded me a lot of Signal to Noise which also has magical music. There is a heavy focus on relationships and life choices and paths, and lots of sappy cheesy moments, also some NSFW scenes. Occasionally the sappy scenes were a bit much and didn't seem to fit with the rest of the characters' actions, but for the most part it was a highly enjoyable read.

I received a copy of this ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

The Backtrack sounded like the perfect romance novel for me: a 2000s emo nostalgia friends-to-lovers romance. Unfortunately, there was little to no chemistry between the main characters and the story itself left much to be desired.

The Backtrack follows Sam as she returns home for the first time to help her grandmother sell her house. Sam left her hometown as quickly as possible and abandoned her best friend, Damon, in the process. Sam has always wondered what would have happened if they dated all those years ago.

There was little to no chemistry between Sam and Damon throughout the entire novel. What little chemistry that had started to build during the flashbacks was quickly ruined as how the flashbacks progressed. Sam and Damon in the present were a mess together. La Rosa relied heavily on implied chemistry and connection from the past without ever showing readers.

Near the end of the novel, mental health played a prominent role in Sam’s relationship with another character. This portion of the novel should have been cut as La Rosa barely skimmed the surface of this relationship and the role mental health played in it. It felt like it was shoehorned in to check off the mental health representation box.

Spice level: 🌶️

Overall, The Backtrack was a disappointing 2000s nostalgia romance with a message about finding yourself before finding love that read as disingenuous considering the outcome of the flashbacks.

This is actually a new-to-me author, but I couldn't resist the promise of 2000s nostalgia and a time travel/timeslip element with the 'magic' CD player showing an alternate version of the main character's life. I mean, how cool is that premise?! I'm so glad I gave in now, because I ended up having such a great time reading The Backtrack. Sure, it took me a little while to properly warm up to the story, but especially the second half was extremely addictive.

The Backtrack gives us so much 2000s nostalgia, and as a millennial this was probably one of my favorite elements of the story. I was a teenager listening to the same type of music as described in the flashbacks, and this made it so much easier to connect to these parts... Including the fashion 'crimes' I was also guilty of during those years. I love that it was the CD player that was turned into the 'magical' object, and who didn't make their own mixtape back then (yes, both cassette and CD for me!). I can recommend listening to the songs while you are reading the flashbacks, as they really do fit each moment in the alternate world like a glove.

This story is mostly contemporary romance with only a mild dose of magical realism along the way in the form of the timeslip/flashback moments. Since each flashback only lasts as long as the duration of each song, the magical realism element isn't overpowering at all... And you should be fine even though it isn't your favorite genre. The Backtrack focuses a lot on family as well as the question 'what if', and the romance is a mix of friends-to-lovers and second-chance-romance. I could have done without the love triangle vibe and the cheating, and I kind of wish there was more chemistry between the main characters, but as a whole it was still interesting to see the two connect in past and present. There is also some steam involved, but thankfully it's just one scene that is easily skipped.

Like I said before, The Backtrack isn't just a romance read. Instead, there is a lot of focus on family with Sam returning home after years to help her grandmother. I could have done without all the drama surrounding her absent mother, and I wasn't a fan of how this part of the story was resolved... But that might just be a personal pet peeve. Abandonment isn't the only more serious topic in play though, as there is also focus on alcoholism, mental health, toxic relationships, bullying and miscarriage among others. Not what I expected, but I guess they do help create more balance the plot.

In short, if you like a good romance with a twist and like the sound of a healthy dose of emo 2000s nostalgia and music, The Backtrack will most likely by right up your alley. It might take a little while for the story to get the ball rolling, but the second half is a true pageturner!

I really enjoyed the concept of the story. It was essentially about right person, wrong time. It was a mix of 13 going on 30, The Greatest Hits, and About Time. Two characters who had to go through what they had to go through, to learn and find themselves so they can be the person they can be 20 years later. Sometimes, love makes you do crazy things and in reality, sometimes love is only just a feeling. To make a relationship work, each person must find and know themselves first before diving into a relationship. And it’s clear that these two characters had to mature and live life the way it intended to happen to finally find their HEA.