The Tangled Boy

Rating:
Summary: Not your average murder mystery!
Review: The mystery plot in The Tangled Boy plays second fiddle to the more important focus of this impressive new novel: the sexual confusion "with a twist" of a sensitive, intelligent teenage boy. Sixteen year-old Cory Williams may have overheard the murder of local socialite playboy Jordan Knight, but his fear of coming forward with what he knows is overwhelmed by his ongoing struggle to find his true self as he floats adrift in a sea of not-so-typical sexual awakening.

Cory has a sort of girlfriend, his good friend Bethanne, but he's not physically attracted to her. However, she remains a supporter and a friend throughout his ordeal. Cory's painfully honest revelation that he is attracted to men repels his closest male friend Sean, and targets Cory as the object of cruelty and ridicule by his classmates. His family, in particular his father, are largely unsupportive of his feelings and his behavior. He is both drawn to and repelled by the dangerous but beautiful Keith, a fellow partygoer at Jordan's house "that night."

Lonely and confused by his conflicting feelings, Cory turns to a longtime family friend, Len, for the support and love he has not found in his small town life. As the twisted tale unravels to reveal Jordan Knight's killer, Cory begins to find his comfortable place in the world.

The Tangled Boy is an unflinchingly honest and realistic portrayal of a young man's coming to terms with his identity. Soles does not paint the other gay men in her story with a stereotypical brush. We see Len and Cory's other new friends first as people, then as men who happen to be gay. In the end, the murder mystery is quickly (although not easily) solved, but, just as important to the reader, Cory learns to accept who he is--a young gay man on the brink of adulthood.