Camp Damascus

May 29, 2023
Erotica author Tingle (Space Raptor Butt Invasion) makes his full-length, traditionally published debut with an eerie but empowering queer horror story. Neverton, Mont., is home to the Kingdom of the Pines, a Christian sect whose claim to fame is their conversion therapy program, Camp Damascus. At the novel’s start, autistic narrator Rose Darling is a god-fearing 20-year-old high school senior (“Kingdom kids” take two years off school to study the Bible) who has fully bought into the sect’s ideology and is proud of Camp Damascus’s “100 percent success rate.” Then she vomits up bugs at family dinner and begins seeing demonic apparitions whenever she experiences desire toward women—especially her friend Martina, who winds up murdered by one of these demons. It becomes apparent that Rose’s parents and her so-called therapist are gaslighting her, a creeping sensation compounded by flashes of memory of a relationship with a woman. The first act is an exercise in slowly mounting dread; then, once the pieces of Rose’s past fall into place, she sets out on a righteous revenge mission. It’s a fresh take on the exorcism trope, made richer by biblical allusions and subtle engagement with Peter Pan. With plenty of crossover YA appeal, this chilling page-turner should win Tingle a slew of new fans. Agent: Dongwon Song, Howard Morhaim Literary.

Starred review from June 1, 2023

Rose, a senior in high school, is a member of a church that has deep ties to her local community and a national reputation for running Camp Damascus, an LGBTQIA+ conversion center with a 100 percent success rate. While hanging out with friends, Rose sees a woman at the edge of the woods who appears to be decaying, wearing a red polo and name tag, and she is staring straight at Rose. This encounter launches Rose on a dangerous path of discovery as she begins to question all she's been taught. Engaging, curious, kind, and proudly neurodivergent, Rose carries the story as Tingle meticulously unfolds a plot that introduces distrust and confusion, building a pervasive discomfort and laying more and more pressure on Rose until it literally bursts, threatening to destroy everything she holds dear. This book is highly entertaining, cinematic, and filled with monsters, both human and supernatural, all of which will lure horror fans to its pages, but what holds it all together is the immense love at the heart of the novel. VERDICT Two-time Hugo finalist Tingle (Straight) has a huge cult following, and his brilliant mainstream debut does not disappoint. Suggest to fans of authors such as V. Castro and Hailey Piper, who take well-worn tropes and explore them through marginalized perspectives, creating something breathtaking and wholly new.

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Starred review from July 1, 2023
Internet-famous, queer-erotica author Tingle presents a timely, authentically chilling story of conversion therapy and its traumatic effects (and that's before the arrival of literal demons). Twenty-year-old Rose is a model member of Kingdom of the Pines, an evangelical Christian sect known for Camp Damascus, a conversion camp boasting a perfect success rate. Like a good Kingdom Kid, autistic Rose follows the Four Tenets, though that means curbing her natural curiosity and self-soothing behaviors. Yet she can't help how betrayed she feels when she's afflicted by terrifying events, including vomiting flies and being stalked by a demon. Once Rose realizes these afflictions happen when she daydreams about a girl she thought was imaginary, it's only a matter of time before she uncovers the truth about Camp Damascus. Tingle takes his time getting to the awful reveal, allowing the intensity of the dread to build while featuring the all-too-real horrors of a community steeped in religion without love. Violence, gore, and body horror abound, yet Rose's journey, in which she learns to be her authentic self, including differentiating her faith in God from her faith in this specific religious community, is entirely sincere and hopeful. Readers looking for queer horror will find this triggering but also cathartic.

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