In an open letter recently posted on School Library Journal’s site, librarian Diantha McBride laments the lack of books for boys. Okay, so librarians and educators are known to do this pretty often (understandably), but McBride goes a step further to point out books in which a female protagonist could have just as easily been a boy, including Ann Halam’s SIBERIA and Gloria Whelan’s THE IMPOSSIBLE JOURNEY.
Mc Bride writers: “I’ve noticed that lots of books with female characters aren’t really about being female. In fact, in many cases, the main characters could just as easily have been males.” The idea is that boys want to read about boys, and couldn’t writers change their protagonist’s sex to help draw these readers in?
On the one hand, getting boys interested in books is an important task. On the other hand, haven’t boys enjoyed seeing themselves as heroes longer than girls have? So many classic adventure stories feature brave boys performing their daring deeds–it’s only fair that girls are getting their turn now.
And then there’s the problem of assuming a writer can write a book just as easily about a boy as about a girl. Even when crafting stories that aren’t necessarily about being female, a writer may have a strong tie to the image of her hero as a girl. This isn’t always true: George Lucas has famously claimed that in his earliest imaginings of Star Wars, the main character was a girl. I doubt he changed that for marketing purposes (although he might have), but it does show that sometimes a hero’s gender is fluid.
What do you think–should writers try to create more boy protagonists in order to appeal to boy readers?
Parker Peevyhouse thinks Leia is cooler than Luke.
Parker Peevyhouse
lindajoysingleton
Joni Sensel
Chris Eboch
Nick
Greg R. Fishbone
…while I see some of McBride’s points, I still fail to believe that boys will only read “boy books.” I believe that’s insulting to the intelligence of boys. And I also agree that boys have had many years of being the heroes, and girls have had to do a negotiated reading of those books and try to find room for themselves in the story. Contrary to what McBride suggests, there are plenty of books with male heroes; it seems to me a wise librarian would point a guy to some Dumas, Bradbury, Heinlein, and the like, and to some of the newer titles put out by Kenneth Oppel, Gene Yang, John David Anderson, etc.
On the other hand:
McBride has a point: – especially once you get into YA lit, things skew heavily toward girls. Publishers do some really bad things with covers of books that could easily be enjoyable for both groups — a lot of pink and strappy shoes and twiggy, angsty looking girls on covers doesn’t proclaim “This book will be interesting to everyone!” I’m all for asking their design departments to seriously reconsider that.
I guess the answer to me is not more “Boy Books” and fewer “Girl Books,” but more books which have characters who are audacious, intelligent, multicultural, differently gendered, and who have friends who are the same. I think we’ll authors and publishers meeting the readers halfway in this manner will create more readers — and better and more intelligent books.
I think it was Janet Reid who reported that in the UK ‘boy adventures’ was what the publishers there were looking for.
I think it’s okay if boys want to read about boys, character identification is important. I know my own teenage boys prefer to read books with male heroes.
I agree about the covers, though. I’d love for my sons to read “13 Reasons”-after all, the main character IS a boy. The cover will make it impossible for me to get them to do so.
Uh, yeah, no.
I might write a book with a boy protagonist because I have a son myself and would like to write something that would appeal to him, but I wouldn’t do it because I “should”.
I have read books with female protagonists where I felt like the author was slapping in a female character to take advantage of the female reading population and you could tell. The characters did not read true.
And, of course, it isn’t like authors have the last say in this. How many slots do publishers give to girl protagonist books compared to boy? Do female protagonist books sell better than those with male protagonists?
That might be the real issue…where is the market?
It *is* interesting to think about this in terms of the market. On the one hand, if girls read more, you’d think the market favors girl protags. On the other hand, if publishers are actively looking for “boy books” a writer could fill that need more easily.
I think there is a need for more books for teenage boys. But I think the boys who read are skipping YA all together. I don’t know that I could write a successful boy book. It irritates me when a guy tries to write from a girl perspective and just gets everything wrong, and I’d be afraid of doing the same thing. I don’t get boys–never have.
On the other hand, my husband has written a screen play that he wants to adapt to a novel. It’d be perfect for aYA boy. He gets boys. I even think he could write boy middle grade.
When I go to the bookstore, I see a number of teenage boys in the sci-fi aisle, not the YA section where there are lots more girls and women. But I found it astounding that some boys were into ‘Twilight.’ Was that so they could be chummy with girlfriends?
I think the issue of book covers is important. We are all drawn in by covers and make assumptions based on them. Perhaps, publishers should consider covers that are more unisex.
I’m not sure if I could write from a boy’s perspective just for the market. In my WIP, the protagonist is a sixteen-year-old girl but her sidekick is a 12-year-old boy. His voice is so unique, my crit group adores him, and I don’t even know where he came from. Just appeared on the pages and feels absolutely natural there.
I write what I know. I don’t know boys. The women/girls that I write are bits and pieces of me or women I know. I really don’t know that many men. And the characters that are male, tend to be enigmatic or goofy or out right evil.
I can see changing up things to encourage boys to read, but forcing authors to make changes to their character’s gender to attract boys to read seems a bit silly. Perhaps asking authors to write original stories for boys would be a better approach.
I agree with the suggestion of changing the covers of some of the books as well. Marketing things as more gender neutral may make a huge difference as well.
Ooh. Where’s my machine gun when I need it?
1. Whoa, whoa… a book with a female MC is somehow supposed to be “about” femininity? Is Lord of the Rings about masculinity? Is Harry Potter? Is National Book Award finalist Feed or winner The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian? Give me a big, fat, effing break. Why should girl books have to be about femininity if boy books can be about anything and everything else? I find this exactly as offensive as people who ask Toni Morrison why she doesn’t write books about white people.
2. We’ve got up & comers like Greg Neri, Eric Luper, recent prize winners like M.T. Anderson and John Green, and old standbys like Bruce Colville, Chris Crutcher, Jon Scieszca, Walter Dean Myers, Louis Sachar, Roald Dahl, Jerry Spinelli, Gary Paulsen, Eoin Colfer, Anthony Horowitz, Orson Scott Card, Chris Lynch… and almost every classic sci-fi author you can name. And that’s off the top of my head and not even trying to identify books for boys written by women. MANY of these authors are writing for teens, not just young kids or middle-graders. I’m pretty sure the collected works of these names alone would keep most boy readers busy for years. If the boys can’t be interested in them or won’t read them, that is a problem of CULTURE, TRAINING, MARKETING, and biological and sociological priorities, NOT a problem of too many girl books getting in the way. (And yes, the covers are marketing issues. But I can’t blame art directors for marketing to their primary audience. See below.)
3. There are any number of inborn and instilled reasons that encourage girls to read more than boys do (and boys to play more video games, read more nonfiction, and become more involved in participant and spectator sports.) Girls are the primary market for books, particularly fiction. There are lots of worthwhile products for which females are the primary market. Take charities, for instance. Studies show that women make 99% of the charitable decisions for their households. Nobody suggests that somebody should spend more time and effort coming up with more macho appeals. Know why? It would be a waste of marketing that could better be targeted at women. I think a lot of the same principle applies to books.
Don’t get me wrong; I definitely think boys need to read (more). I just get really tired of the implication, if not the outright statement, that the effort should be at the expense of even a single book with a female MC. Books with pink sparkly covers and twiggy girls on them are not likely to have content that appeals to boys anyway — or it’s simply a bad cover, if it does.
–>Bottom line: When we stop training boys from practically the womb that girls are lesser creatures, less able to be brave, less able to be smart, less able to be adventurous, less able to be independent, the boys will be more willing to identify with them. To write books without important female characters would worsen the problem, not solve it.
— Joni, who has published two novels and a picture book with male MCs, a picture book with a female MC named Jo whom everyone mistakes for a boy, and a third novel with an important boy sidekick — because the STORY should dictate who the MC should be, not misguided moaning about gender gaps.
I have to agree, Joni. I think of “boy” books and there is a great selection. The boys just stop reading at a certain age it seems.
I tend toward boy MCs. My MG trilogy has a boy MC as does another MG series I’ve started. But my YA has a female MC. Hmmm… interesting when I think about that.
Our giveway book this month has a boy MC (Demon’s Lexicon). I wonder if this has drawn more teen guys to read it.
PJ, I keep thinking about The Demon’s Lexicon while I read these comments. The main characters are boys (brothers) but the cover is so girly, even though it pictures a boy (he looks like he’s wearing makeup!) I actually think girls will be more drawn to TDL more because it’s all about relationships, but I can see boys liking it too.
Parker, it totally feels like more of a “girl” book. I agree completely on the cover, and I read it and it seems to have that relationship factor girls care so much about.
But I do think a guy who reads it would enjoy it. Guys are reading Twilight these days, too
Can I be your best friend?
You say exactly what I mean to say, WAY more articulately.
And sorry, that rant wasn’t aimed at Heidi; I can’t ever seem to get the comment where I meant it to go.
I agree with Joni’s “rant”. Especially “When we stop training boys from practically the womb that girls are lesser creatures, less able to be brave, less able to be smart, less able to be adventurous, less able to be independent, the boys will be more willing to identify with them. To write books without important female characters would worsen the problem, not solve it.”
Just today I put up a post at PBS listing series MG/tween books featuring adventurous girls (here). Why? Because a mom wrote to me about how her daughter felt like too many books with girl protagonists are about princesses, and they wanted adventure, where the MC is a girl. I was thrilled that I could think of several recommendations off the top of my head, and it would be tragic if those series were turned into boy books. Of course I think boys would enjoy all of the recommended books, too… Back to agreeing with Joni.
I agree with everything said here (go, Joni, and everyone else…) and only want to add one little thing: Sales and Marketing divisions have a big voice (and often, the veto vote) in what is acquired and how it is marketed.
I once was two inches from signing a four book deal for an atypical Faerie Princess story with a big publisher. At the last minute I was told, that ‘Sales’ had finally found the time to actually read the 100 sample pages and was no longer behind the acquisition. They had assumed a typical girl-product/faerie princess series, something that could have glitter on the cover, they said. My ms was “too intellectual” and “not nearly girly enough” to “fill the sales slot” they had been hoping to fill. And so the offer was withdrawn. I learned one good lesson: It ain’t over until the Sales Department sings.
A book’s “gender appeal” is always a consideration for the publisher. Far too much so, I think, but girls buy more books than boys, I have been told by sales people.
So perhaps that is the reason for Jay Asher’s 13 Reasons cover? Male author, male protagonist, and a fairly girly cover. It is a NYT bestseller of the best kind (word of mouth, not monster hype. It climbed UP the list as time went on). So maybe girls are discovering it and telling the boys?
I think it’s up for debate but should ultimately be up to the writer; some characters that present themselves might appear to be usable as either a male or female but often in the writer’s mind they can only be one gender and this is difficult to overcome, at least in my opinion; of course, ironically, I’m writing about a male hero… haha
I’m a bit late commenting on this, but I was beyond enraged by the SLJ article. What on Earth does it mean to say that “lots of books with female characters aren’t really about being female”. What is a book about “being female” about anyway? Shoe shopping? Periods? What the author reveals is the fact that male experience is still the default in our culture, still privileged over the female, which is only authentically female anyway if it confirms to some specific set of gendered behaviours. We’ve come a long way, baby… not.
Conforms. Sorry!
It’s so important to draw attention to reading, and attract reluctant readers to it,especially boys. In fact, I’ve recently completed a feature magazine article on this subject that comes out in October, “Help for Struggling, Reluctant Readers.”
I grew up as a reluctant reader, in spite of the fact that my father published over 70 books. Now I write action-adventures & mysteries, especially for tween boys, that avid boy readers and girls enjoy just as much.
My blog, Books for Boys http://booksandboys.blogspot.com is dedicated to drawing attention to the importance of reading.
Keep up your good work.
Max Elliot Anderson