Overview

As monster theory highlights, monsters are cultural symbols, guarding the borders that society creates to protect its values and norms. Adolescence is the time when one explores and aims at crossing borders to learn the rules of the culture that one will fit into as an adult. Exploring the roles of monsters in coming-of-age narratives and the need to confront and understand the monstrous, this work explores recent developments in the presentation of monsters--such as the vampire, the zombie, and the man-made monster--in maturation narratives, then moves on to discuss monsters inhabiting the psychic landscapes of child characters. Finally, it touches on monsters in science fiction, in which facing the monstrous is a variation of the New World narrative. Discussions of novels by M. R. Carey, Suzanne Collins, Neil Gaiman, Theodora Goss, Daryl Gregory, Sarah Maria Griffin, Seanan McGuire, Stephenie Meyer, Patrick Ness, and Jon Skovron are complemented by analysis of television series, such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Westworld.

Full Product Details

Author:   Ildiko Limpar
Publisher:   McFarland & Co Inc
Imprint:   McFarland & Co Inc
Weight:   0.350kg
ISBN:  

9781476683485

ISBN 10:   1476683484
Pages:   257
Publication Date:   19 March 2021
Audience:   General/trade ,  General
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   In Print  
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Table of Contents

Acknowledgments vi Introduction: Monsters Roaming the Space of Coming of Age 1 Part I-Monstrous Family Matters 1. The Monstrous Friend and Lover: Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Stephenie Meyer's Twilight Saga 16 2. Apocalyptic Monsters in Need of a Family: Daryl Gregory's Raising Stony Mayhall and M.R. Carey's The Girl with All the Gifts 36 3. The Rebellious Child: Jon Skovron's Man Made Boy and Sarah Maria Griffin's Spare and Found Parts 58 4. Oppressed Daughters and Oppressing Fathers: Theodora Goss's The Extraordinary Adventures of the Athena Club Series 81 Part II-The Monstrous Wilderness of the Teenage Mind 5. Dangerous and Safe Spaces: Neil Gaiman's The Graveyard Book and Coraline 100 6. Destructive and Healing Psychic Landscape: Siobhan Dowd and Patrick Ness's A Monster Calls 121 7. Spaces of Escape for the Abused: Seanan McGuire's Wayward Children Series 140 Part III-Inhuman(e) Frontiers of Growing Up 8. Alien New World Wilderness: Patrick Ness's Chaos Walking Trilogy 160 9. Muttated New World Garden: The Hunger Games Trilogy 181 10. Frankensteinian Wild West for Adults Growing Up: HBO's Westworld 197 Conclusion 219 Chapter Notes 225 Works Cited 235 Index 247

Reviews

Explores the historical and contemporary narrative of the monster in fiction...focus[es] on adolescent dealings with monsters, and the different parts of society they occupy...Limpar gives readers familiar references as they read about monster psychology and how the characters' reactions to their circumstances parallel real-life reactions to things out of one's control. This book is an interesting read for all lovers of fantasy and horror, and its academic tone could also make it useful for a freestyle literature course. --Booklist

Author Information

Ildiko Limpar is a senior lecturer of English at Pazmany Peter Catholic University in Budapest Hungary.

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