Focusing on romance, crime fiction and science fiction, identifies the literary
features of popular fiction while arguing that it is a distinctive field of literature;
for advanced readers.
Jeet Heer and Kent Worcester, eds., A Comics Studies Reader ( Jackson: University
Press of Mississippi, 2009).
Twenty-eight critical essays using a variety of approaches to examine the history
of comic forms, including cartoons, comic strips, comic books, Japanese manga,
and graphic novels, with excellent discussions of thematic interests, narrative craft,
and visual techniques. Some essays are more appropriate for advanced students.
Jerold E. Hogle, ed., The Cambridge Companion to Gothic Fiction (New York:
Cambridge University Press, 2002).
Useful resource providing historical overview of the Gothic genre, complete with
chronology and guide to further reading, from the late eighteenth to the twenty-
first century; offers various interpretive approaches. The introduction provides a
concise overview with discussion of variations, while chapters 13 and 14 discuss
contemporary fiction.
Edward James and Farah Mendlesohn, eds., The Cambridge Companion to Science
Fiction (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2003).
Defines science fiction as a literary genre; traces its history; describes four critical
approaches drawing from Marxism, Postmodernism, feminism, and queer theory;
and examines various themes.
Kathleen Gregory Klein, ed., Diversity and Detective Fiction (Bowling Green,
Ohio: Bowling Green University Popular Press, 1999).
Collection of essays and critical introduction that examine the way writers explore
issues related to racial and ethnic diversity within the context of detective fiction.
Paul Lopes, Demanding Respect: The Evolution of the American Comic Book (Phila-
delphia: Temple University Press, 2009).
An essential overview of comic-book culture, covering the last seventy-five years
of production and interest on the part of readers, fans, and scholars. Chapters 4,
5, and 6 are most relevant to the contemporary period.
Patrick McGee, From Shane to Kill Bill: Rethinking the Western (Malden, Mass.:
Blackwell, 2007).
Analysis of representative films from the 1930s to the present that focuses on
the history of the American Western film and provides a discussion of the genre
that is applicable to literature as well as of social and historical contexts affecting
the genre.
Steven McVeigh, The American Western (Edinburgh, Scotland: Edinburgh Uni-
versity Press, 2007).
Examines the importance of the Western in American literature and film in the
twentieth century, pinpointing recurrent uses, subversions, and revisions of myths
and symbols. The last three chapters are particularly useful for the contemporary
period.