I’m not going to lie, at first glance Throwback looked like it would be an incredibly long read. Thankfully, this was not the case at all. In fact, Throwback ended up being my favourite out of all the Maurene Goo books that I’ve read. It was refreshing to read a story featuring a mother-daughter relationship between a first generation and a second generation Asian American, as more commonly we get stories that focus on the coming of age experiences of first generation Asian Americans. And while I’m probably closer in age to Sam’s mom, Priscilla than Sam herself at this point, I was still able to relate to her frustrations at how she and her mom are so vastly different from each other to the point that they were constantly at odds with each other. They say don’t mess with the past, but I’m glad that Sam did and was able to get the opportunity to not only better connect with her mom, and understand where she came from but also to help others like Mrs. Jo along the way. The whole subplot with Mrs. Jo was both heartwarming and hilarious, heartwarming because of how Mrs. Jo helped Sam so much despite not knowing who she was and hilarious because of what Sam did to ensure that she would be much better off in the present.

As someone who was born in the 90s but was just a kid during that decade, it was interesting seeing the things back then through the eyes of a Gen Z teen. Things like how openly sexist people used to be, as well as how it wasn’t cool to be Asian back then, unlike now where both Japanese and Korean pop culture have exploded into the mainstream media, may come as a surprise to teens today. So, come for the fun 90s nostalgia and references, but stay for an intergenerational time travel tale that is surprisingly heartfelt and tender. Goo perfectly captures the nuances of the relationships between Asian moms and their daughters when she writes about how parents just want their kids to be happy, but sometimes their definition of what it means to be happy isn’t the same as what their kids’ definitions is and that’s okay as long as long as both parties are willing to try to communicate and meet each other halfway.

I was given an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. I also bought my own finished copy.

Wow. Given how much I've enjoyed other YA novels from Maurene Goo, this book was highly anticipated for me, and it did not disappoint. Though this book has less romance in it than her other ones, there was a different featured relationship that was just as important: mother-daughter. When Sam and her mom get into a huge fight, Sam is sent back to 1995, where her mom is a high school senior. Sam has to help her mom win homecoming queen and get back to her own life in the future, but more importantly, she has to befriend her. I loved reading about the progression of their relationship just as much as I enjoyed the nostalgia this book made me feel. Various fashion and culture references had me cracking up and reminiscing.
And, yes, I did enjoy the sprinkle of romance in here. I do wish that we got even more from the romance, but I do understand that it was never meant to be at the forefront of the novel.
If you like books about mother-daughter relationships (or season 6 of Gilmore Girls), time travel (hello, Back to the Future!), or set in the '90s, I think you might like this one.
Can't wait to read more from Goo!

I received a copy of this book for a fair and honest review. This book make me feel a lot of things. There is a bond between mother and daughter like no other. I am not normally in to time travel books but something about this story just pulled me in and would not let go. I was a little disappointed with Sam when the book started, but as she spent more time in the 90's and interacted with her teenage mother she was a bit more hands on to the situation her mother was in and what she had to go through to the woman she became. It was a story to take to heart.

I was excited to begin this because I came of age in the 90s and thought it would be very relatable. I also like learning more about families different than my own.

For a YA novel, it was a little slow to get into, and I really struggled to finish. The scenes in the 90s were fun but I could've used a little more description and setting. The tone of the relationship between the daughter mother and grandmother was a little uneven at times as well.

It wasn't terrible and I think I'm just not the right audience. I like where is the relationship between the granddaughter and grandmother, and the scenes in the 90s were fun, and overall it was a very heartwarming tale as both mother and daughter finally saw each other in a new light.

I love when I pick up a book and it blows my mind. Maurene Goo was able to do this with Throwback because the description just did not do it any justice. I look forward to reading more from her in the future.

Thank you to netgalley and the publishers for providing me with an arc for an honest review.

I really enjoyed reading Throwback by Maurene Goo. I'd be lying if I said I didn't shed some tears while reading. I couldn't help but think about my relationship with my mom and what life was like for her here in the States, as an immigrant from the Philippines, while providing for the family and raising kids.

I also see some of what my teen daughter and I are going through now. It's interesting to see how mother-daughter relationships change or are similar through generations. This book is now on my daughter's shelf with her other books by the same author, and I hope she likes it as much as I did.

Samantha Kang was a funny and insightful narrator who navigates her time travel with clever quips and a lot of feminist, 21st century perspective. The romance was pitch perfect and the relationships she builds with her mom and grandmother in the past really raised the stakes for this story. A great blend of fun and substance.

This is a great book. Samantha is the main character and narrator of the book, the daughter and granddaughter of Korean immigrants. She is in high school, not sure she wants to keep dating her boyfriend and is always butting heads with her perfectionist mother, Priscilla. Priscilla was not able to go to college and wants more for her daughter. Samantha has different ideas for herself. She is more interested in journalism.

One day Samantha gets out of bed and prepares to go to school, like normal. The bus doesn't show up so she calls a rideshare from Throwback Rides - where she is delivered to her school but in 1995. Specifically, she is in high school with her *mother* who is her age, and running for homecoming queen. More is on the line than a tiara for a day - the homecoming queen will also win a college scholarship. Winning that scholarship could change Priscilla's life in a big way. Without it, there is no money for college. Her mother has a dry cleaning business, and Priscilla works there after school.

Priscilla did not win in her past and did not go to college. Samantha figures out that she has been sent back to help Priscilla become Homecoming Queen - which will award her the scholarship - which will change her future. Samantha's hope is that this will enable her to return to her own time. Much to her surprise, she also discovers that she is not the only person in the school from a future year who has the same dilemma.

This is a story of generational conflict, Korean immigrant experience, time travel, and romance. I received an ARC from the publisher Zando Projects via NetGalley, and voluntarily read and reviewed this book.

Travel back in time with Samantha Kang!

After an argument with her mother, Samantha travels back to the 90s to help Priscilla, her now teenaged mother, win Homecoming Queen.

The story focuses on Sam getting to know her mother as a teenager.
The book was fun, charming and sad in parts.

Loved it!

It took me awhile to warm up to Samantha, she came across as spoiled in the beginning.

I liked how she learned to see her mom and beloved grandmother differently.

The humor was great. The book had me tearing up a few times.

I've read the authors earlier books and this one was just as good as the others.

Loved the small romance quite a bit.

The ending was just happy happy joy joy feel good smile on my face gooey good glowing feeling joy.


Thank you Net Galley the author and publisher for the e arc and this is my honest review.

Selling these at the store

Highly recommended. 4 stars!

A current day version of Back to the Future starring a Korean American female protagonist? Sign me up. At the start of the novel, protagonist Sam has a strained relationship with her mother, Priscilla; they never see eye to eye. She's much closer with her grandmother, whose relationship with Priscilla also seems strained. After a blow up fight with her mother leaves her stranded at the mall, Sam downloads a new rideshare app to take her to school. When she gets there however, things seem off, and she shortly realizes that she's been transported to the year 1995! She meets her teenaged mother, and quickly comes to the conclusion that she must have been sent back in order to make sure that her mom wins homecoming queen. Can she accomplish her mission, or will she be stuck in the 90s forever? Read to find out.

This is such a sweet story about family, empathy, and the immigrant experience and how it shapes future generations. In the past, Sam gets the chance to see her mother as a teenager and her grandmother as a single parent, and really has her eyes opened. The way that her grandmother interacts with her in the present day is quite different from the way she acts with her own teen daughter in the 90s, of course. She gets to develop a true friendship with her mother, one that she never would have found without this experience. I adored the 90s references, and watching a teenager used to today's world learn how things were back then. There are some pretty good comedic scenes that come out of this. The biggest focus of this novel is obviously on the relationship between Sam and Priscilla, which is fantastic. I also did enjoy the small romance element as well. This novel made me both laugh and cry; such a joy to read.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley. Review based on final copy. All opinions are my own.
I’ve enjoyed some of Maurene Goo’s prior work, so I was very curious about this pivot into new genre territory with Throwback. Granted, it’s not super technical in terms of the rules of time-travel, with that aspect simply existing to serve the overall fun of the plot, but I enjoyed it nonetheless, and feel it made for a more natural transition as opposed to something more science-heavy. It’s a lot of fun, with a lot of it focused on the little details about how much has changed, especially technologically. And time travel via rideshare is also a nice touch.
And with one of my favorite things about Maurene Goo’s books being how she develops parent/child relationships, I loved the exploration of that here. Sam’s relationship with her mother is challenging at the beginning, contrasted by her more close relationship with her Halmoni. And while it’s hinted early on that her mother, Priscilla doesn’t have the best relationship with Halmoni, I loved that juxtaposition between how Sam views them as adults vs. seeing them when she’s the same age as Priscilla and being able to understand her mother’s perspective a lot more, as well as gaining more insights into what made Priscilla into the woman she ultimately became. And with a health scare for Halmoni being a driving force in the present, I love how going back in time also helps Sam to evolve in her perspective about her grandmother.
There’s also a pretty cute romance, and while it didn’t blow me away, I liked how it (like Sam’s relationship with her mom in some ways) also transcended time.
This is a fun read, and I love that Maurene Goo tried something a little bit different. I recommend this to anyone who wants both a fun time-travel story and a moving narrative about mother-daughter relationships.

If you are a fan of movies like Back to the Future or Seventeen Again, then this is the book for you. I loved seeing the 90s references and the main character's experience with living in the 90s and seeing her mom as a teen. This book is about family, love, and how we don't always know everyone as well as we think we do. I highly recommend it.

From the synopsis: Back to the Future meets The Joy Luck Club in this YA contemporary romance about a Korean American girl sent back to the ’90s to (reluctantly) help her teenage mom win Homecoming Queen. I am a huge fan of books that delve into mother-daughter relationships, like Freaky Friday or, yes, the Joy Luck Club, and this book uses this theme well. Throwback explores the complex ties of inter-generational family relationships and the immigrant experience, but does it with a lot of heart and humor. Watching Gen Z learn how to navigate the 90s without Google was fun. Readers of YA will love this delightful book.

🚕 Sam and her mom Priscilla just can’t seem to get on the same page about anything. But things escalate when her grandmother falls into a coma. After a heated argument, Sam books a ride via a ride hailing app and ends up in 1995 — as her mother’s classmate!

❤️ There’s so much to love in this story about a Gen Z girl navigating 90s high school life and getting to know her mom years before she becomes her mom. I loved the insight into mother daughter relationships, Korean-American culture, first-gen immigrant perspectives, and so much more.

✨FUN, heartwarming, and oh so poignant. Don’t miss this brilliant YA book by @maurenegoo 🥰

Heartwarming and full of strong, female characters. I enjoyed the way Goo wrote this story and the way she handled the shifts in time. Thank you negalley for this arc in exchange for my honest opinion.

Back to the Future meets Freaky Friday and John Hughes movies in this YA gem.
⏳
Samantha has never gotten along with her mother, Pricilla. She has way more in common with her mom’s mom and continually wonders how she came from Priscilla at all. When a huge fight sends Sam back to 1995 she’s suddenly living out her senior year homecoming, only this time it’s with her 17-year-old mom! As Sam tries to help her mom win homecoming queen to right a wrong from the past, she realizes how misunderstood Priscilla is and the two grow a close friendship. Along the way Sam also meets Jamie, a guy who helps with her homecoming crusade. When the crown is announced, will that be enough for Sam to fix everything?
👑
Maurene is always a win for me. Honestly, I Believe in a Thing Called Love was the first book I read about k-dramas and thus began my obsession with reading as many #aapibooks as I could. I can always count on her books to be funny, relatable and swoonworthy. Add in a Back to the Future storyline and I’m sold! I loved the cover for this as well. This, like all of Goo’s novels, needs an @netflix adaptation. A huge win in my opinion!

CW: racism, microaggressions, coma, hospitalization, death of a parent (recounted)

Yay! A YA novel that actually reads like YA.

From the very beginning I felt like I was in the mind of a teenager. Sam's inner monologue is exactly what I'd expect from a teen and she is well developed and interesting.

My only gripe is the ending feeling a bit rushed, or just not sufficient, but it doesn't deter me from recommending this book to teens or anyone else who enjoys true YA.

I love a Maurene Goo YA novel.
Her writing is fun, fresh and kept me staying up way past a reasonable bed time.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Zando Projects for providing me with an eARC of Throwback in exchange for my honest thoughts!

I found Throwback to be quite the touching, humorous, and sometimes devastating YA read. The complex mother-daughter relationship at the core of its story did a good job at hitting me in the heart where it needs to, especially as someone who's had plenty of struggles with my own mom (reading this also reminded me a bit of the equally riveting mother-daughter dynamics in Everything Everywhere All At Once and Turning Red). The 90s backdrop, Sam having to confront the sudden shift from her Gen-Z environment to her new millennial setting, and the exploration of America's racist views towards Asians are all elements that compelled me, too, particularly as an Asian-American Gen-Zer. Don't go into this expecting fleshed-out time-travel mechanics, though; that's a surface-level element compared to the rest of the narrative. As for the side romance that unfolds down the line, maybe it will come off to some readers as extraneous, but I thought it was cute and woven into the story smoothly enough.

Overall, I'm officially rating Throwback 4 out of 5 stars. I'll be keeping an eye out for more of Maurene Goo's work.

This is such a sweet coming-of-age YA! Not typically my genre of choice, but I had a fun time reading it to help me pass the time at work. This book is really a flawless balancing act; Maurene Goo does such a great job balancing heavier topics like generational trauma, the immigrant experience, loss of a parent/grandparent, and strained mother-daughter relationships with the lighthearted fun of time travel and the idea of letting a zoomer loose in a 90s high school. The main character Sam won't be for everyone, but I loved how strong, bold, and take-no-shit she was. Her "woke" quips that left everyone in the 90s confused as hell genuinely made me laugh. I would love to see this made into a movie, it's such a unique and modern spin on Back to The Future that I think would really resonate with a lot of people.

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review!