Dad Bod

Portraits of Pop Culture Papas

ByCian Cruise

Published June 2022

Paperback

^$ 22.99

Description

A brisk, humorous collection of essays that redefines the mythos of fatherhood depicted in film, television, and video games.

What do dads tell us about the world? Not your real dad, but dads in general. Dads are everywhere. Lurking in our movies, television shows, and video games. Spouting homespun wisdom and atrocious jokes, wallowing in might-have-beens and back-in-my-days, or rigidly defending the status quo. These fictional dads fuel a myth of fatherhood. What is that myth trying to tell us? And what is it trying to sell us?

Dad Bod is a clever, riveting collection of essays about father figures in popular culture. From Gandalf to Homer Simpson, Die Hard to The Mandalorian, these essays unpack the tropes that inform our collective image of fatherhood. Follow Cian Cruise, newly minted dad, as he riffs on the stereotypes and lore of fatherhood, traces a contemporary art history of dads in popular culture, and journeys to the heart of dadness to become a better father.

A RARE MACHINES BOOK

Reviews

Funny, perceptive, and thoughtful, Cian Cruise’s Dad Bod is constantly curious about the pop culture artifacts it interrogates. Plus, he extracts parenting advice from First Blood, which no book has ever done before.

Naben Ruthnum, author of A Hero of Our Time

Cian Cruise is a great writer and a great father, and a never–ending source of interesting insights. Dad Bod takes those qualities and mashes them up with the dads you know from popular culture, to figure out what it means to be a father.

Misha Glouberman, co-author of The Chairs Are Where The People Go

Cian Cruise is a great writer and a great father, and a never-ending source of interesting insights. Dad Bod takes those qualities and mashes them up with the dads you know from popular culture, to figure out what it means to be a father.

Misha Glouberman

Cian Cruise’s irreverent exploration of fatherhood in pop-culture shrouds a cosmic reverence for the teaching it contains, whether that’s in video games, television, or movies. The religious attention that the essays of Dad Bod bring to beloved media properties provide new insight not only to their subjects but also to human life and all of its deepest mysteries.

André Babyn

I rarely think about the challenges of fatherhood…this book offered me a brand new perspective I have never considered.

I’ve Read This blog

Dad Bod explores pop culture papas with irrepressible verve...It shines as a cultural criticism, a memoir, and a parenting guide.

Foreword Reviews, starred review

Contributors

Cian Cruise

Cian Cruise has a degree in film studies and philosophy and works as a freelance writer, strategist, and consultant. His cultural criticism has appeared in Hazlitt, Maisonneuve, Playboy, Vulture, and Little Brother Magazine. Cian lives in Almonte, Ontario.

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Book Details

Paperback
June 2022
5.5x8.5 in
272 pp
9781459749474

PDF
June 2022
-
240 pp
9781459749481

ePub
June 2022
-
240 pp
9781459749498

Dad Bod

Portraits of Pop Culture Papas

Description

Of Related Interest

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Reviews

Contributors

Cian Cruise

Book Details