The Thunder in His Head (Everything We Shut Our Eyes To & The Thunder in His Head)

"Thunder" is a perfect analogy to describe everything pounding through protagonist Kyle Manning's head in the course of the novel. His parents are going through a divorce, and both now have significant others--including mom's new boyfriend, Reece, who Kyle is harboring a deep attraction to. One of his best friends may be struggling with an eating disorder, and another is harboring unrequited feelings of his own. Then drops in Dwight Varley, a cute guy who doesn't make the best first impression, but his relationship with Kyle takes off and sets a whole other set of complications in Kyle's life. And to add fuel to all of this, Kyle doesn't exactly handle anger well.There's a lot going on in this book, and Gene Gant balances them well. Having read a novella from him earlier, I expected more strong voice and a lot of emotions boiling up to keep me hooked, and I was not disappointed. The various aspects of Kyle's life don't feel like separate issues weighing down on him, but rather a series of interconnected issues both from the outside and inside that he struggles to overcome.I especially liked the parental interaction in this story. For gay teens, coming out and parental acceptance are huge walls, and even though Kyle is already out of the closet, we see his dad still struggling to deal with it without being a jerk. And support from his girlfriend, Stephanie, counterbalances him well. And with feelings for his mom's boyfriend that he's struggling to keep down, maybe anger is festering in him from the complicated relationships he's being thrust into through the divorce. And when Kyle finds out about Dwight's secret, it looks like he travels down the same path as his father's addiction, which was a great way to tie Kyle's family drama together with his relationship drama.The characters were fully realized, and Gant spent enough time for you to care about every single one of them. And they all serve the plot, so no miscellaneous stragglers tacked on. From eating disorders to lack of self-confidence, the aftermath of divorce to the high-driven emotions of sex, and even some particularly nasty fist-fights, Gant is firing on all cylinders with this novel, and I found myself so absorbed in this world that I couldn't put the book down.I absolutely recommend this book and look forward to reading more of Gant's excellent work!

Sometimes the best thing for you is right in front of you. That’s a difficult lesson Kyle has to learn. Crushing on his mom’s boyfriend is nothing but trouble Kyle knows that, he just doesn’t want to accept it. Kyle has to learn how to control his anger and let go of the rage. When he finally gets a boyfriend, he manages to screw that up too.I really enjoyed this story. The best part for me was that we got more of Dwight’s story from “Everything We Shut Our Eyes To”. That book left me hanging. 4.0 for Stephanie.

I didn't actually finish it until this morning, because when I got to the point last night where I couldn't keep my eyes open, I decided it was time for bed, but The Thunder in His Head is definitely a page turner.The primary and secondary characters were all well rounded, well thought out, "real" people, with authentic emotions and great dialogue--i.e. they sounded like human beings, not English professors. (Dialogue is one of my personal pet peeves, so I'm always extra thrilled when an author nails it just right). The plot was equally authentic feeling. There were no "short cut answers", no quick fixes to big problems--just like in real life, characters had to work things out the hard way.The only thing that kept me from loving it totally was the epilogue; without getting into spoilers, some of the plot points felt a tiny bit rushed, which might have been all right (it was an epilogue after all), but it jarred me right out of the story to have the narrative change from first person past tense to first person present tense for the last few pages.

This is my second book by this author and I really enjoyed it as well. I thought this one was paced very well - it is not a mystery or scifi, just realistic coming of age novel and I was glued to the pages as if I was about to find out something incredibly interesting and important. I did found out something interesting and important - how the protagonist went through important changes in his life, but it was just told very well I guess. I also liked that adults were multidimensional and interesting enough, which is often a problem even for the best YA that I have read.

Absolutely great in my opinion.