 A male @-@ centred viewpoint dominated English @-@ language comic books throughout the 20th century and , with few exceptions , placed women in subordinate roles as victims , helpers , or sex objects . To academic Katie Mullins , Seth 's narrative viewpoint follows from this tradition , though the book superficially has little in common with the masculine adventuring generally associated with mainstream comic books . The author 's female characters play peripheral roles , and the character 's obsessive collecting and self @-@ absorption alienate him from relationships with females , who at times encourage him to find meaning in life outside comics — advice he ignores . The book highlights the overwhelmingly masculine homosociality of the collector 's world , which Seth hints at with the name of the " Book Brothers " book store the character frequents . In one panel , the store sign is obscured so that only " Book Brothe " is visible , suggesting a " Book Brothel " , and thus evoking the fetishism inherent in collecting . The intelligent Ruthie provides a love interest that nevertheless manages only to feed Seth 's self @-@ absorption : he is attracted to her physically and also to her bookishness , but she takes second place in his life to his obsession with Kalo , whose real name she discovers for him . Seth finds he does not know her well enough to give a satisfactory answer to Chester 's " So what 's she like ? " Whenever she leads the conversation to her own thoughts and interests , Seth changes the subject . She ends by leaving him . 
