Review: Camp Damascus

Camp Damascus by Chuck Tingle
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Thanks to Netgalley and Tor Nightfire for gifting me an early copy of this book. Below you'll find my honest review.

The internet knows Chuck Tingle as the writer of very strange, very specific erotic fiction... until now. This short novel will make everyone realize that he's not just a weirdo (which he is), but he's also much, much deeper.

This book revolves around the lengths religion will go to in order to change people it sees as "bad" even at the cost of stepping outside ethical or moral bounds or being hypocrites themselves. And as a gay man raised in the Bible Belt, I could completely identify with this situation.

My biggest gripe with this one is that, in the end, I needed just a bit more. I needed some more closure. I needed to understand how things were going to be moving forward in this world, and I didn't get that. But the rest of the book? Yeah, it was a masterful fictionalization and hyperbolic/fantastical revelation of what many of live on a daily basis because of the actions of "Christians" who "love us." (Please notice I put quotation marks for a reason.)

All in all, a powerful book that will put Chuck Tingle on the "normal" side of the literary map. But for the world's sake, I hope he continues writing both the "normal" and the "weird." The world needs more people pushing boundaries in good ways.

Highly recommended.

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