Tomas, J.  Without Sin.  2009.  240p.  Prizm, $13.95.  (1-60370-684-4).  Gr. 10-12.

Sixteen-year-old Jacob Smithson, a boy with a temper, falls passionately in lust—and love—with 18-year-old Avery Dendritch on the first day of classes at St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Boarding School for Boys where he was sent after being kicked out of public school for fighting.  Throughout the fall, their relationship deepens as they continue to risk being outed because their attraction becomes more and more obvious to the other students.  The book focuses on their romance and the reactions to it with the primary conflict being whether Jacob can keep from attacking others because of their rumors and slurs.  The descriptions are thorough and realistic in this narration of two gays exploring their bodies and their need for each other.