YES: Why boys don’t read very much: They want manly courage — not teen angst.

Boys read a lot less than girls, because assigned reading is oriented toward girls’ tastes, writes Tom Sarrouf on the Institute for Family Studies. Boys are “more interested in war, comedy, sports, and science fiction, and more excited about informational texts,” while girls prefer narratives and romances. “Boys are also far less likely to read books by female authors or with female protagonist, but girls were willing to read books written by men and with male protagonists.”

Boys get enough exposure to nonfiction, writes Katya Sedgewick on American Mind. They need to read classic literature with male heroes. (According to the 2024 What Kids Are Reading report, Diary of a Wimpy Kid is on reading lists from elementary to high school, she writes. Not good enough.)

Sedgewick grew up in the Soviet Union reading Twain, Dumas and Tolstoy. She makes a case for The Adventures of Tom Sawyer as a “rebel child living by wits and daring.” (I loved Tom Sawyer as a kid.) “I find it strange that teachers don’t see it as their job to connect the next generation of Americans to their heritage, preferring to submerge students into the sea of forgettable contemporary titles rather than explaining complicated language and showing their students how to love historic writing.”

As a high school English teacher and father of young readers, Auguste Meyrat thinks boys need more books with “action, conflict and even violence” and fewer books focused on “feelings and relationships.”

Boys aren’t girls.