Reading about girls

I just interviewed emily danforth, author of The Miseducation of Cameron Post, which was written as a literary coming of age novel and sold as YA. Stylistically and thematically, it's very literary, and yes, the title character is a teenage girl. The author told me that she's heard from fortysomething men who are enthusiastic readers, but said they never would have picked up the book if it hadn't been reviewed on NPR.

Maybe reading about a teen girl is more OK if she's a lesbian? I'm not entirely kidding, because I've spoken to guys who seem to think any book about a teen girl with a heterosexual love angle will be a retread of Twilight.

I can understand that they might not want to read pages and pages of rapturous description of the MC's love interest. (I don't, either, but such romantic gushing isn't totally unknown in books with male protagonists, I feel compelled to mention. It was bigger in the 18th century, but it's not unknown today.) Anyway, that is only one possibility.

ETA: One of the first canonical English novels, Richardson's Pamela, is about a teen girl and her issues with a hot (but, sadly, kind of rapey) guy. If you modernized the language and class issues, it would fit right into modern YA. And people of both sexes and all ages loved it. Moll Flanders is part female coming of age story, too.

fadeaccompli said:

Conversely, knowing the males in my life, men simply aren't all that interested in westerns, car magazines, or novels where battle scenes and war figure heavily in the story. (Quick! Guess who in this household reads GRR Martin, and who has the enormous Tamora Pierce and Mercedes Lackey collections!) While there are certainly culturally influenced trends, no one gender is a monolith.

Unless there's someone out there with a unique gender, in which case that person is. (Shine on, you crazy diamond!) But, y'know. In general.

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This is a good point. I don't think I know a single, real life person, male or female, who reads Westerns. My stepdad sure watches a lot of them, but reading, it's usually history or gnostic theology--ancient, non-fiction-related stuff. When it's fiction, it's the Classics taught out of high school textbooks--Hemingway, Faulkner, Tolstoy, all those guys.

My brother used to just read philosophy and memoir; now, he's into YA in a big way. I think his girlfriend got him into it, but he loves The Hunger Games and Harry Potter now.

My dad reads EVERYTHING--biographies, new agey metaphysical stuff, old sci-fi pulp novels, thrillers, and whatever I give him for his birthday/Father's Day/Christmas.

None of them read car magazines.

I read a Western once. It was a short story. For class. Does that count?

I only like traditional Westerns when cowboys are the villains.

Wow. A lot of you people have a lot of enlightened folks around you

I don't know any guys IRL (who still identify as guys) who would openly admit to liking a book about girls.

But then, I don't know many guys, or people who read.

My big anti-sexist triumph with the male people in my life was getting Dad to drink a Bahama Mama once. It took an unbelievable amount of arm-twisting. He said it was "fruity lady stuff" so we SHOVED IT DOWN HIS THROAT

(not that much arm-twisting. He liked it, actually.)

Most of the guys I've come across around the area I live in are, outwardly, very CARS GUNS BOOBS WEIGHTLIFTING WHISKEY TRACTORS WAR MOVIES AND GOD HELP YOU IF YOU LIKE ANYTHING FOR CHILDREN OR WOMEN YOU PUSS

But I wonder how many of them really feel that way...

Someone upthread (I think it was Squeaky Pram him/herself?) said "Men are seen as the default in our society and women are the other"? Or something to that effect? In which case, I think you did answer your own question quite brilliantly (unless I'm wrong and can't remember who said it because I'm a woman and I'm too busy thinking about shoes and tulle and how to destroy other people's lives using only rumors and backhanded compliments). I do think that's changing, slowly, but the concept is still there. While women being "like men" has gotten a lot more acceptable over the past...I dunno, let's say hundred years or so, for the hell of it...society is still struggling to cope with the idea that it's okay for men to be "like women." (And of course, "like men" and "like women" aren't really well-defined terms, but most of us have these concepts hammered into us such that we have an idea of what it means...you know what I mean. Pink flowers and blue monster trucks. That shit.)

So, to the haters, a man who reads a book about teenage girls must identify with a teenage girl, which is unacceptable to those who believe in this whole "it's not okay for men to be women" thing, I think.

Unless he has a daughter, which changes things a bit, I hear. (It's okay to try to identify with girls for the sake of your child.)

Anyway. I think this thing exists, of not taking girls and women seriously as serious people with serious thoughts. There are a lot of people who don't feel that way, obviously (all the wonderful people on the thread, for example), which is good, but there are some who do, which is dumb. I do think it's changing for the better, though. Just slowly. And probably, those who are reading enthusiasts are a bit more into seeing the world through different eyes.

Another literary novel about teenage girls - not published as YA but read in high schools and apparently banned by some of them - is Joyce Carol Oates's Foxfire. It's just been filmed for the second time.

JCO has written four novels which were intended as YA and published as such, with a fifth on its way later this year.

Rhoda Nightingale said:

This is a good point. I don't think I know a single, real life person, male or female, who reads Westerns.

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You MUST read The Sisters Brothers by Patrick deWitt. Now. Hands down the best novel I read last year, despite being *gasp* a western.

CaroGirl said:

You MUST read The Sisters Brothers by Patrick deWitt. Now. Hands down the best novel I read last year, despite being *gasp* a western.

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Yo, how can you mention Westerns in a thread about reading about girls without mentioning True Grit?

Maddie Ross is awesome.

I hereby admit I will read any book about teenage girls passed to me if it's well written. (footnote: I tend not to look for books on my own and, when I do, they're almost always sci-fi)

I'm particularly fond of anything subculture related. Romance and/or sex won't necessarily turn me off but I'm not drawn to it either, in any genre. I'm far more interested in well formed characters with interesting relationships. A decent plot doesn't hurt either, preferably one where said girl actually, well, does something. The teenaged girls I knew before they stopped being teens either gamed, youtubed, drew, read, chatted, studied, went out, watched TV, did drugs, partied, drank, had sex or otherwhise while their time away with the same stuff I'd expect most teenagers do. Their tastes haven't changed much into the twenties either. Then again, to put this in perspective, I might not be the stereotype of a 'grown up male', considering my bedroom is at risk of being overrun stuffed animals.

Concerning the male stigma when it comes to books about teenage girls, I'd definitely say it exists. Our society tends to be sexist in both directions, even when we're trying not to be. But I'm also seeing a change in younger generations, at least where I live. The gender gap, while still existant, appears to be closing. Girlfriends aren't just 'things to look pretty' anymore but 'best friends who can do more fun stuff'. And having girl friends (without the relationship, affair or otherwise sexual attraction bit) isn't anywhere near as strange as it used to be. Never thought about it before because it's the world I grew up in but the whole idea must be very off-putting for older generations.

p.s.

Most of the guys I've come across around the area I live in are, outwardly, very CARS GUNS BOOBS WEIGHTLIFTING WHISKEY TRACTORS WAR MOVIES AND GOD HELP YOU IF YOU LIKE ANYTHING FOR CHILDREN OR WOMEN YOU PUSS

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If you strike cars, weightlifting, tractors and the anti-female prejudice, you've got my personality down to a T. Honestly, there's got to be a market for men who like guns, alcohol and fluffy, childish things. Admittedly, the tastes don't mesh very well and are best enjoyed separately.