My Side of the Story by Will Davis

Remember being 17? Yah, me neither. “My Side of the Story” helps you remember though.

It's not your traditional coming out tale. The main character, Jaz, doesn't endure a bunch of soul searching before he accepts the fact he likes guys. He's already out and about, cruising bars, trying drugs, sucking dick, and even though he does get outed a few times, that's not really what the sotry is about.

It's about family and friendship and school and bullies. It's about not being friends with the people you used to be friends with. It's about your parents not understanding you, and you not understanding them, and you not caring to try even. It's about teachers trying to reach out to you, and you being all Like I Could Give A Shit. It's about that fragile budding independence, wanting to get out and soar on your new wings, but still needing that nest to retreat back to. It's about growing up.

Jaz is not really a sympathetic character, but he doesn't care if he is. He comes off as selfish and immature and already too cynical. His walls are already in place. What built those walls? A distant father, a smothering mother, an over-achieving religious sister? The other kids at school, the Bully, the Goth, the Jock, the Cheerleader, the Best Friend?

As Jaz gets into fights with his parents, his sister, his friends, his classmates, his teachers, he has those kind of small epiphanies that briefly illuminate the darkness and confusion of adolescence. And although they are brief, and fade before the end of the story, you know that those lessons come back. You know this because we all want through this. Maybe we weren't all sneaking out to gay bars to pick up hot guys from Brighton, but we all rebelled against things we didn't even know we were rebelling against. We all know that impotent self-centered frustrated angst that only the modern teenager can so wholly capture. We all have those stories.

This is his side of the story.

Sometimes the only way to see the world from a different angle is to stand on your head.

This has been a bobert review.