I Can't Even Think Straight

From the Stonewall Award–winning author of The Black Flamingo comes a new novel in verse, in which a biracial young man confronts issues of race, class, and sexuality.

Kai knows who he is to others: the reliable grandson, the best friend, the romantic backup. But he doesn’t quite know who he is to himself.

Though Kai desperately wants to come out at school, he keeps himself closeted. His best school friend, Matt, who is also queer, is afraid of getting kicked out by his religious parents if they knew—so he stays closeted and asks Kai to do the same. Kai unhappily goes along with it, but when a rumor goes around that Kai and Matt are together, Matt starts acting differently toward Kai anyway.

Kai’s other best friend, Vass, is nonbinary and doesn’t care who knows it. Vass feels that Matt is a negative influence, putting a damper on Kai’s identity—but maybe that’s just Vass’s crush on Kai talking. Caught between his best friends, Kai turns to writing to express his emotions. But when he explodes, he puts everything at risk.

Dean Atta’s poems deal with themes of race, gender, and identity. He regularly performs across the UK and internationally, and his work has been shortlisted for the Polari First Book Prize and has appeared on MTV and BET. The Black Flamingo, his debut YA novel, won the Stonewall Award. He is also the author of Only on the Weekends.

“Atta touches in gentle, sensitive ways on many significant themes. An emotional novel in verse that reads like an actual teen’s diary.” -Kirkus Reviews

ISBN: 9780063158030