The Backtrack
Erin La Rosa
Pub: 7/16
4☆

Life, rewound…

If you’re in the mood for a nostalgic, what if love story, look no further. 🧡

I adore Erin La Rosa’s writing and the The Backtrack was no different. It was so much fun to read and was just what I like in a rom-com. It was the perfect mix of humor, slow-burn romance, magical realism, finding yourself, oh and one lovable horny grandma. 😂 Yes, you read that right. Pearl was by far one of my favorite parts.
Time travel can be hit or miss for rme but La Rosa did a great job with the past/present timelines while keeping everything believable, and giving us a fun look at alt Sam and Damon.

What I enjoyed;
💿 Small Town
💿 Second Chance Romance
💿 Magical Realism
💿 Grandma Pearl
💿 Music References

Thank you so much HTP Books, The Hive, and NetGalley for the gifted physical and digital copies in exchange for my honest review.

I loved this book! Big thanks to Net Galley and Canary Street Press for my advanced copy.

This was such a unique concept. La Rosa was able to conquer the dual timelines trope in a way that was satisfactory and fresh. Damon and Sam were both beautifully flawed, and the family dynamic between the Leto women added extra complexity that rounded out Sam’s backstory and made her more relatable. I loved the songs spread throughout, and I’m SO glad Damon was able to see the visions too and understand where Sam was coming from. Erin La Rosa never disappoints!

It comes out July 16!

This book is for millennials. Sam goes home after 10 years of being away and her room is a time capsule from high school. This author drops so many throwbacks- cucumber melon lotion, body glitter, Jansport backpacks, low rise jeans AND the music- Fall Out Boy, Yellowcard, Panic! At the Disco. It was so fun.

Every time Sam put on her Walkman she went back in time to an alternate reality of her high school self. I loved it.

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I loved this book! It's well-written, enjoyable, and a great read. Erin La Rosa did a great job of writing in a way that captured my attention, and made me not want to put it down until I was finished! I would highly recommend it!

Wow! This book kept me engaged throughout the entire way through! The back and forth between two separate potential timelines for Sam and Damon made for a compelling story that made me think about all the choices made along the way in our relationships. This is my first read from this author but I definitely will look up more from this author in the near future! Thanks to NetGalley and Harlequin Trade Publishing for the early copy of this title.

I must fall into the same age bracket as the author because the songs used to tell this story were a huge part of my college/young adult years. The nostalgia is strong with this one! It’s a light, breezy, fun read which touches on heavier themes but they don’t weigh down the story. A lot of fun.

While the premise was intriguing and the nostalgia was strong, particularly with the 2000s music and cultural references, I found the execution lacking. Some parts of the story felt a bit forced, and the magical elements seemed almost unnecessary given the strong backstory between the characters. Despite this, the chemistry between Sam and Damon was palpable, and the depiction of small-town charm was endearing.

This was my first book by Erin La Rosa. If you want to travel back to the days of high school, have a love of emo or punk rock, and wonder “what if” you had made one decision different, than this book is for you. Much to my dismay, I wasn’t the right reader for this book as I knew none of the referenced songs nor related to the high school antics, fashion or culture nostalgia. This book had too much of a niche and characters that didn’t win you over in likeability. The concept of a mental teleportation Walkman with song by song visions of a life that might have been, was an incredibly clever storyline that felt different and new in comparison to films such as Thirteen Going on Thirty, 17 Again or The Change Up.

all the stars possible

This is not my first or second Erin La Rosa book, but it's for sure my favorite. it's so nostalgic and I think Erin wrote Sam with me in mind because I was also a very emo band geek who's best friend was a guy who we lost contact after high school (except my phase was in the '90s and not the '00s haha). I've often played the what if game, but there's not one moment that I can go back to change our present.

HOWEVER, this book! Ugh! Part reverse 13 Going on 30 part summer A Christmas Carol. The freaking songs, the fashion, the feelings, all was just a warm hug and walk down memory lane. I gobbled this book up in less than 24 hours and now I'm so sad I'm done and it's over.

What I loved most about this book is that it's so much more than a second chance romance. It's about finding yourself and loving who you are before you can love someone else, it's about families and the tough decisions we make to protect the ones we love (or are we hurting them), it's about mental health, it's about trusting your instincts and being strong. The family dynamic part along with the flashbacks really, really hit me in the feels. I really can't say enough about this book (even the acknowledgements in the back written in a playlist form was genius), but I think Grandma Pearl deserves her own shout out.

- Second Chance Romance
- Family Drama
- Past Trauma
- It's Always Been You
- Finding Yourself
- Time Travel/Haunted CD Player
- Small Town
- Slow Burn

Thank you, NetGalley, Erin La Rosa, and Harlequin Trade Publishing for this ARC.

This book feels like it is a love letter to elder emos and the music they never stopped listening to.

This book was a such a fun read and while I do think it is for the elder emos I do think those who didn’t grow up with MCR and Paramore will still really enjoy this one.

I found myself getting exciting seeing what song would be next on the playlist and thinking back to when I listened to some of the songs myself.

I also really liked the idea of the characters seeing their past what ifs. What if they had made that choice what would their life looked like. What direction would their future have taken them.

While we got a lot of past Sam and Dameon I wished we would have gotten a bit more present versions of them. I did like what we did see, how that while they hadn’t seen or spoken to one another there was an ease to them.

I would definitely recommend this if you are looking for a bit of nostalgia. Also good if you are looking for a best friend second chance romance.

Overall rating 4 out of 5 Spice level ODD open door descriptive language and imagery.

The Backtrack is the perfect novel for those who love second chances, “what ifs”, best friends, healing, finding yourself and all the 90s nostalgia.

Sam and her best friend, Damon, do everything together. They’re a bit in the “emo” group in high school but at least they have each other until… that moment comes when there is the opportunity to shift from the friend zone to more than friends. Sam is terrified of being stuck in small town Georgia. As soon as she has the opportunity to leave for flight school she does and never looks back.

Ten years later she has to return to her hometown to help her grandma who raised her. The “what ifs” linger in Sam’s head as she arrives. Should she reach out to Damon? What if he wants nothing to do with her after she broke his heart.

As if hurt grandmas and awkward old friendships wasn’t enough Sam now finds herself listening to her CD player and somehow back at her high school and reliving the past but only for a few minutes at a time. Is this alternate reality showing her she made the right choice or showing her what she missed out on?


Don’t walk but run to add this to novel to the top of your To Be Read pile. I flew through the pages and didn’t want the book to end. It was light hearted with a bit of time travel. Great read to show the impact that each decision has on your life. I will definitely be recommending this to all my book loving babes whether you’re a romance reader or not. July 16 can’t come fast enough. I’ll be on the lookout for more books by Erin. This will definitely be in my re-read pile! Thank you NetGalley and Erin La Rosa for allowing me this read in exchange for an honest review.

I really, really enjoyed the last few chapters. I feel like a lot of character development and depth happened there. Otherwise, I found the novel a little generic, lackluster, and skimmable. The writing was okay, but nothing extraordinary, and the time travel devise was under utilized or oversold. It was a breezy read, but not one I’d pick up.

Sam and Damon had the quintessential bffs that could become lovers timeline that would be a dream to have. However, Sam’s mother leaves her scared to be stuck in her hometown. After a decade away from home, Sam is back in town and ready to head back to Paris as soon as she can, but she is given the rare chance to see how her life could have turned out if she had just kissed her best friend.

I absolutely loved the 13 Going on 30 vibes of this book. I cannot imagine having a magic item that allowed me to see what would happen if I had made a specific decision and could not interfere. Sam definitely had so much more understanding support than I ever would had I told anyone in my life about this discovery.

This book definitely took me a little bit to get through. My favorite parts of the book were definitely the scenes that happened while Sam was listening to the mixtape. I felt like there was a bit of a lull everytime we saw Sam’s current life where she went through the same cycle of inner monologue. Around the 50% mark I could not put the book down and NEEDED to know what happened, much like Sam.

So happy to have received an ARC from Netgalley and Harlequin publishing!

Title: The Backtrack
Author: Erin La Rosa
Genre: Romance
Rating: 4 out of 5

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 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.

This was an interesting read to me. It did a great job of placing me in the early 2000s—that was a little unsettling, actually—and I really like both Sam and Damon and their alternates. Sam’s grandma was a hoot and she really had me laughing. I liked how well-done the setting felt, both in the present and the past, and that made this story a believable read for me.

Erin La Rosa lives in L.A. The Backtrack is her newest novel.

(Galley courtesy of Harlequin Trade in exchange for an honest review.)

"Within the span of a few days, she'd gone from thinking love would happen to her someday, to seeing a past where she was deeply in love."

A fun, quick read about the what-ifs and feeling the need to escape where you grew up. The musical nostalgia for any of us who were in high school in the early aughts is also top notch. I didn't find the magical realism elements to be as well done as day, Seven Years Slip, but I appreciated that the alternate timeline was full of different complexities - it made it feel much more honest. 

✌️2nd Chance Romance
👩‍❤️‍👨HS BFFs
💿 Mixed CD combined with alternate timeline
🎵Aughts emo music - lots of nostalgia
🏫Returning to hometown
🚪Open door (but minimal scenes)

Thanks to Netgalley and Harlequin for the eARC! Publishing 7/16!

im a big fan of Erin's previous work and I was so excited to be picked to read this new book! I loved it so much! it had everything you would love from a romcom, angst, teenage love, great music taste, TIME TRAVEL?!!! umm sign me up! this was so cute and funny! im not a huge fan of the friends lovers trope but this book had me hooked! oh to get a chance to go back to high school and rewrite an ending. id probably would do it!

***Thank you to Netgalley and Harlequin for an advanced reader copy of The Backtrack by Erin La Rosa! All thoughts are my own!***

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, her spunky grandmother Pearl decides it’s time to sell the family home. Sam is summoned back to help pack up the house.

The 2000s nostalgia from Sam’s old bedroom hits immediately: Fall Out Boy posters, Lip Smackers, roll on body glitter, even her favorite CD player with a mixtape from her best friend, Damon Rocha. Damon was always a safe place. Sam 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.

When I tell you, I felt all the nostalgia in this book. From Sam's bedroom to the songs on the CD that I listened to on the radio when I was on the school bus, it was a lot of what I grew up with. It made me feel like I had gone back in time as well.

This is definitely one of Erin's most slow burn romances and certainly not as spicy as her other romance books, but I really enjoyed the story all the same. The tension is there but it's more pining than anything, which I didn't have an issue with. Having Sam and Damon have a second chance after all the time apart was so sweet.

I think using the CD to show Sam and Damon what could have been with them was a really unique concept. Using songs from the early 2000s was a great way to incorporate their feelings for each other back in high school and beyond in these alternate memories.

Overall, Erin La Rosa has done it again with an amazing romance story that will have readers rooting for her couples!

The Backtrack by Erin La Rosa releases July 16, 2024!

The Backtrack by Erin La Rosa is such a delightful read! Bethany Turner called it "the musical emo love child of 13 Going on 30 and (500) Days of Summer", and I couldn’t agree more with that description.

Sam Leto’s return to Tybee Island to pack up her grandma’s house is packed with 2000s nostalgia that hit me right in the feels. From Fall Out Boy posters to Herbal Essence shampoo, I was transported back to my middle school days. Sam and Damon are such lovable characters with their "elder emo" vibes, and Grandma Pearl is just the best. She’s got her flaws but seeing her grow even at her age was so heartwarming. And her relationship with Jessie? If that isn't me and my bestie when we're old, I don't want it. As for Sam's mom... well, let's just say you need to read to find out about her.

The story's pacing was spot on, with a great mix of music-driven flashbacks and the present timeline. The miscommunications felt realistic and didn’t make me want to scream at the book, which is always a plus.

I really connected with the themes of second chances and figuring out what matters in life. The grand gesture at the end was pure Hallmark, and I loved it! Sometimes, you just need that kind of happy ending.

The Backtrack is a fantastic, nostalgic trip that hits all the right notes. Erin La Rosa has written a story that's not just about looking back, but also about embracing the now and what could be. Highly recommend for a feel-good read that takes you back in time!

First, thank you to NetGalley, Erin LaRosa and Canary Street Press for giving me early access to this book!

As someone who had every song they mentioned in this book on her own iPod in high school, so much of this story felt familiar and close to home. Sam and Damon are best friends from high school who feel something more for each other. But Sam is afraid of getting stuck on the island they call home and refuses to lean into her emotions. 10 years later, this jet-setting pilot returns home to help her grandmother move out of her childhood home while grappling with the mother who left her behind and the best friend she’s grown apart from (but missed) - and how to reconcile all of those pieces with the life she always wanted in the skies. While all this emotional work is happening, Sam finds the mix tape Damon made her the night she rejected him and plays the CD on this possessed/magical CD player that shouldn’t work anymore. Every song on his playlist shows her an alternate life for the two of them if she had said “yes”.

While it honestly sounds like a ridiculous concept, the book works pretty well. Sam and Damon have a great relationship and good chemistry - though I wish we had gotten more time with them in the book. Their alternate versions are fascinating and I love the idea of “what if?”. The rest of the characters in the book are fun and serve their purposes well. It’s always interesting to read a book where a character comes home like Sam does because you’re literally thrown into these memories and lives of people you really have no concept of - and they’re only around for little bits here and there.

LaRosa writes a captivating book about love, loss, grief, depression, and the power of hope. I really enjoyed this approach to the love story of two high school friends (and their adult selves) and the sometimes confusing reality that “what if?” doesn’t always lead to a happy ending (or at least one right away). I also appreciate that she handled the family drama for Sam with tact and grace, though it really did feel like a hurricane of everything happening in the moment.

Overall really well done. I think it dragged in a few spots, which is why I gave it a 4 star rating but I really enjoyed the concept… and now want to go power up my iPod (or my Spotify playlist at the very least!) and lean back into my own high school memories and relationships for a moment! If you were a fan of Twilight, Blink-182, Dashboard Confessional, Yellowcard or anything good from the 2000s, then you’ll appreciate so much of this book! Enjoy!

Thank you to Harlequin Trade Publishing and Canary Street Press for the arc!

Plot Twist was one of my favorites of last year so I was very excited to read a new La Rosa book.

I am truly beginning my magical realism era. I used to be such a skeptic about them, but if the premise is unique enough I’m in love. 🫶🏻

And this was unique for suuuure. It will give you all the nostalgia. This one is for the twihards. Like if you like alt from the 2000’s, this is a must read!

We also have a great second chance romance. Another thing that can be hard for me. But they actually never dated. It was more of a what could have been situation. They were friends who chose different things. And through the magic of a mix tape (lol) you get to see what if.

This was a lot of fun! I still think Plot Twist is my fav, but I def recommend this one!

It’s out mid July!