THE BOY'S BODY BOOK

A guide for navigating male adolescence.

Dunham, a registered nurse, considers topics including physical changes, body care and feeding, health, school and home life, relationships with family and friends, staying safe, and handling stress. These subjects are addressed generally and conservatively: she mentions wet dreams and breast swellings but not masturbation, condoms, or sexually transmitted diseases, for example. In the “Dating and Romance” section she says “don’t put pressure on yourself to start that part of your life too soon,” and there’s no recognition of the possibility of same-sex crushes. The strength of this particular guidebook is its emphasis on more-adult habits of personal hygiene and behavior at home, with friends, and at school. Added for this fourth edition is new material on “learning disabilities,” social skills and body language, personal empowerment, reputation building, being brave without being a bully, staying safe in the real and virtual worlds, and reminders about the boundary-crossing action of accessing private information without permission. Björkman’s cartoon illustrations show boys and adults of varying ethnicities and lighten the tone throughout. Even libraries already owning the third edition (2015) may want this revision, which adds helpful information for the growing segment of the teen population identified with cognitive and social-learning differences.

This introduction to puberty may be particularly helpful for boys just entering that stage.