https://maloryauthor.com/essays/ Essays on the male reader, boys and books, and the fiction that serves them — from Malory, Sci-Fi, LitRPG and Progression Fantasy author. en-gb https://maloryauthor.com/essays/the-wee-county-experiment.html https://maloryauthor.com/essays/the-wee-county-experiment.html Fri, 21 Aug 2026 09:00:00 +0000 Or: the one place on Earth where boys out-read girls, and why it didn't fix anything. https://maloryauthor.com/essays/the-megalosaurus-test.html https://maloryauthor.com/essays/the-megalosaurus-test.html Fri, 14 Aug 2026 09:00:00 +0000 The first paragraph of Bleak House, and a fair question about who could read it now. https://maloryauthor.com/essays/worried-your-son-might-be-a-reader.html https://maloryauthor.com/essays/worried-your-son-might-be-a-reader.html Fri, 07 Aug 2026 09:00:00 +0000 There is a real psychological instrument for measuring how manly your son is. Reading is on it. https://maloryauthor.com/essays/the-loneliest-hobby.html https://maloryauthor.com/essays/the-loneliest-hobby.html Thu, 30 Jul 2026 09:00:00 +0000 Or: why nobody took Ian McEwan’s free novels. https://maloryauthor.com/essays/everyones-a-homer-expert-now.html https://maloryauthor.com/essays/everyones-a-homer-expert-now.html Thu, 23 Jul 2026 09:00:00 +0000 Or: the film's more faithful to the spirit of the poem than you'd think. https://maloryauthor.com/essays/the-one-word-experiment.html https://maloryauthor.com/essays/the-one-word-experiment.html Fri, 17 Jul 2026 09:00:00 +0000 One word flipped the boys’ reading gap in a single afternoon. What stereotype threat says about the 2026 literacy panic. https://maloryauthor.com/essays/the-age-of-reading-isnt-over.html https://maloryauthor.com/essays/the-age-of-reading-isnt-over.html Fri, 10 Jul 2026 09:00:00 +0000 The Atlantic says reading is dying for everyone. The data says the collapse is male and arrived a generation early. https://maloryauthor.com/essays/the-oldest-sneer-in-publishing.html https://maloryauthor.com/essays/the-oldest-sneer-in-publishing.html Thu, 09 Jul 2026 09:00:00 +0000 Not real reading — three words that keep turning up at the edge of every argument. https://maloryauthor.com/essays/the-bookshop-that-was-never-there.html https://maloryauthor.com/essays/the-bookshop-that-was-never-there.html Thu, 02 Jul 2026 09:00:00 +0000 It isn’t phones or willpower. Most of the time it is supply. https://maloryauthor.com/essays/the-compound-interest-of-reading.html https://maloryauthor.com/essays/the-compound-interest-of-reading.html Fri, 26 Jun 2026 09:00:00 +0000 Reading for pleasure beats parental education as a predictor of maths at sixteen. https://maloryauthor.com/essays/a-chilean-experiment.html https://maloryauthor.com/essays/a-chilean-experiment.html Tue, 23 Jun 2026 09:00:00 +0000 Two studies on how reading got filed on the wrong side of the line marked manly. https://maloryauthor.com/essays/mens-and-boys-reading-statistics.html https://maloryauthor.com/essays/mens-and-boys-reading-statistics.html Sun, 14 Jun 2026 09:00:00 +0000 A sourced, myth-checked roundup of where men and boys stand with reading, and where the audited data runs out. https://maloryauthor.com/essays/a-field-guide-to-the-performative-male-reader.html https://maloryauthor.com/essays/a-field-guide-to-the-performative-male-reader.html Fri, 12 Jun 2026 09:00:00 +0000 The Performative Male Reader, catalogued — seven species, one blind spot, and the clandestine readers the whole panic keeps missing. https://maloryauthor.com/essays/mudies-did-this-to-us.html https://maloryauthor.com/essays/mudies-did-this-to-us.html Fri, 05 Jun 2026 09:00:00 +0000 Or: how a Bloomsbury library talked men out of fiction. https://maloryauthor.com/essays/the-manospheres-best-customer.html https://maloryauthor.com/essays/the-manospheres-best-customer.html Fri, 29 May 2026 09:00:00 +0000 Or: the judgement isn’t real. The man selling it to you is. https://maloryauthor.com/essays/dad-books-arent-dying.html https://maloryauthor.com/essays/dad-books-arent-dying.html Thu, 21 May 2026 09:00:00 +0000 Or: it's not pining for the fjords. It's just on Audible. https://maloryauthor.com/essays/how-to-manufacture-a-man-who-doesnt-read.html https://maloryauthor.com/essays/how-to-manufacture-a-man-who-doesnt-read.html Sat, 16 May 2026 09:00:00 +0000 A century of schools, stereotypes and tests built men who don’t dare read — and where boys’ reading actually went.