Big Baby

From comedian and TikTok star Kevin James Thornton comes a hilarious and heartfelt story of growing up in a Christian fundamentalist church, turning trauma into comedy, and finding your own way.

‘If you’re an outlier or feel like a total outsider, you’ll find aspects of yourself inside these pages.’
ANNIE LENNOX

Growing up in the 90s in a small town in Indiana, Kevin James Thornton had little notion he would one day make a career as a comedian. Like most kids in his deeply Christian town, his free time revolved around his church community—drinking Messiah Macchiatos at the youth group cafe, bedazzling his jacket with the words “Jesus Is Lord,” and evangelizing in the streets of Spanish Harlem dressed as a sin-themed clown. But when he started to question his sexuality, life became complicated. Kevin began to realize that the community that raised him might never truly accept him.

What follows is a winding story of self-discovery, following Thornton from a revelatory summer in New York City to the transformative years of college—where he finds like-minded people, a knack for performance, and first loves—all the way to adulthood, where he navigates complicated relationships, finds his way into the comedy scene, and forms a special bond with a black cat named Comet (who might just have the power to travel between dimensions). Through it all, he redefines himself again and again, realizing that few things go as planned, and that “driving off into the sunset” is never really the end of the story.

Told in his unique brand of brash but emotionally honest humor, and filled with 90s nostalgia, Big Baby is a coming-of-age tale that speaks to anyone who feels like they don’t fit in.