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Populist rhetoric regarding a "crisis in masculinity" has seen concerns raised about the twinned issues of boys and reading, which has culminated in a call for more "books for boys" in the fields of children´s and young adult literature. Books for Boys examines the ways masculinity is both represented in Australian young adult literature and representative of wider gender discourses. Focusing on texts produced since the 1990s, and adopting a generic approach, Troy Potter shows how genre is implicated in books for boys to respond to and shape public perceptions of masculinity. While some novels may rethink and reconfigure genre and gender, the author demonstrates through close readings that the majority of books for boys reinscribe traditional constructions of both in order to model "appropriate" gendered practices.

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CONTENTS


Acknowledgements vii

Introduction: Matters of Genre and Gender 1

Chapter 1: Investigating Masculinities: Novels of Mystery and Detection 12
Untangling the Past 17
Dad´s the Word 25
Uncanny Places 31
Conclusion 37

Chapter 2: Young Anzacs: Engaging with War History 39
Returning to the Bush 44
The Tragic Hero 47
Past Parallels 56
Conclusion 64

Chapter 3: Life Lessons: Navigating Crisis in Novels of Development 66
Driving Lessons 71
Querying Compulsory Heterosexuality 79
Maintaining Class Behaviour 86
Conclusion 89

Chapter 4: Fools in Love: Orienting Happiness in Comedic Novels 91
Fake It Until You Nearly Make It 96
Accommodating Humour 102
Looking at Happiness 108
Conclusion 114

Chapter 5: Still Human: Survival in Post-Disaster Fiction 116
Maintaining Your Humanity 120
Reordering Bodies 130
Quest for Purpose 136
Conclusion 141

Chapter 6: Marvellous Bodies: Humanism and Action Science Fiction 142
Thrilling Bodies, Humanist Ideals 147
The Price of Being Superhuman 153
Disabling the Body 159
Conclusion 164

Conclusion: Constraints and Choices 166

Bibliography 170

Index 189

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Potter, Troy
Troy Potter has a PhD in Literary Studies from Monash University, Australia.

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