Hello Everyone!

How’s it going? I’m so happy this workweek is over, aren’t you?

I’m making a lot of progress at my new job, but it can get exhausting. Time for some R&R!

I finished a book last night called Camp Carnage, written by Joshua Winning and Elliott Cross.

This is another buddy read with Iseult Murphy, but this post itself is my singular opinion.

I picked this book out for us because

1. It is horror
2. It is LGBT
3. It was free on Amazon!

We could hardly wait to hack into this one, so let’s get this review started!

Blurb:

In the summer of 1986, Billy Collins is sent to his own personal Hell – summer camp. The remote Camp Genesis offers desperate parents a place to “straighten” out their gay teenagers with the help of the puritanical Katherine Creevey.

Besides the typical horsing around, campfire tales and summer games, the Genesis program forces gay and questioning teens into humiliating gender-based lessons. While Billy wants nothing more than to escape Camp Genesis, he can’t help worrying that something even more sinister is hiding just out of sight.

Unknown to Billy, two campers were murdered three years ago. Just days after Billy and the new campers arrive, people start to go missing, and it’s up to Billy and his new friend Jem to find out what’s really going on. Is a maniac on the loose? Is history repeating itself? One thing’s for sure – at Camp Genesis, you have to fight to survive… 

GoodReads

The Review:

I give this novel four and a half bloody stars!

This book centers on a group of LGBT teenage kids sent to a gay rehabilitation camp. Most of them are pissed that they’re there in the first place, but when kids start to disappear, several of the kids take matters into their own hands in an effort to stop the kidnappings and locate their missing friends. Can they locate the perpetrator before it’s too late, or will they become the next victims?

I immensely enjoyed this book.

The way it was written felt like an 80’s slasher flick, only written down, and that really worked for me.

The characters were overall pretty great. Billy and Jem were my favorite, but others had distinct personalities like Kyle and Michaela. Obviously they kids are not happy about their families sending them over to gay camp, and their reactions felt authentic. I wouldn’t be happy either, and I’m glad my parents didn’t sent me to a gay camp back in the day. Inherent to a slasher flick, the characters in this book did lack a little bit of depth and could’ve had more development, but I didn’t judge very harshly due to the apparent vision of the authors.

The plot is captured pretty well in the blurb. It’s a bunch of gay teens at a gay camp. People start to go missing, and while some blow it off to teenage hormones, some of the smarter characters start to wonder what’s really going on. Besides the main plot, there are still some amusing camp antics like the crushes and rivalries, and that made this experience feel so much more real to me. Who doesn’t have a thing for the hottest guy at camp?

I did have a couple little quips. The ending kind of left things too open for me as far as what happened with the perpetrator, and I wanted to know more. I also wanted verification of the actual deaths for certain characters, but we didn’t get that.

Altogether, this book was a great LGBT slasher experience, and I enjoyed every minute of it. We definitely need more books like this out in the world!

That’s a Wrap!

Thanks for stopping by, and happy reading!

Have you read this book before? What did you think? Do you have a book recommendation similar to this one? Feel free to share in the comments!

If you’d like to see other reviews of mine, feel free to check out the book review section of my blog or my GoodReads. You can also follow my GoodReads reviews here. There are some great binge-worthy books on there!

Have a great day!

***

Can’t get enough of Jaunts & Haunts?

Subscribe to my newsletter for in-depth updates on my writing, reading, and watching experiences, special deals, and important announcements regarding upcoming publications.

Also, feel free to check me out at the social media links below!

***

Facebook | GoodReads | Tumblr | Instagram