Steinbeck wrote The Pearl (reissued in 2000) in a fable form, in which he relates the woes of a poor Mexican fisherman who finds a pearl one day and decides that it will change his life for the better. Unfortunately, the fisherman finds out that life is not so simple.

Coming-of-age stories abound, and some of the best were written by Ernest Hemingway. His stories about Nick Adams have been collected as The Nick Adams Stories (1981) and follow the development of the main character from childhood to adulthood.

In her book Mona in the Promised Land (reissued in 1997), Gish Jen writes her interpretation of adolescence, complicated by her Chinese-American teenager's decision to convert to Judaism.

The setting of William Saroyan's novel The Human Comedy (reissued in 1991) is wartime America, and its protagonist is a young boy who is determined to become...