A review by twiller
Camp Damascus by Chuck Tingle

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated

3.0

This book is a mixed bag for me. On one hand, fucking LOVE Rose Darling she is the character of all time she has so much personality and I love just existing in her head for a lil while. I’m not autistic specifically but am neurodivergent and she’s one of my fav portrayals of neurodivergence maybe ever; Chuck Tingle KILLED IT w/ her. I also find Chuck Tingle’s writing super interesting in general, the first person present combined with blunt descriptions of emotion the skirt the line of the show-don’t-tell “rule” (something which Chuck Tingle openly disregards anyway) is rly interesting. On the other hand, I feel the body language in this book is severely lacking. I rly love the dialogue but the complete lack of character movement to accompany is almost distracting. It makes it hard to rly get a feel for these characters, especially the ones that are introduced later, which sucks.
I’m also not obsessed with the ending. There’s certainly a level of catharsis to it but I feel like “and then all the BIG MEANIE ASSHOLES got fucking YOINKED and DIED and WENT TO HELL” is a lil,,, simplistic to say the least. I felt like Smith n the pastor guy actually got some decent depth in the last few chapters, showing how they rly do think they are being compassionate, in their own twisted ways. Perhaps I was just expecting this book to be smth it isn’t, but I thought the ending would be much more humanist and love-focused (as Tingle’s work tends to be), maybe even showing the perpetrators some of the compassion they refused to show their victims. Not a terrible ending, but not rly what I specifically was looking for
So yeah, mixed bag. That being said, I still think it’s an interesting read and I would generally recommend it on the strength of its unique concepts alone.
Expand filter menu Content Warnings