"Boys and Girls" is first and foremost a coming-of-age story, and Munro writes it from the female perspective. The world is full of these types of stories dealing with boys and their achievement over hunting and killing an animal, or winning a race, or a variety of things, but this same type of story dealing with girls is a bit less common. This particular coming-of-age is set against a rather grisly backdrop of the fox-fur trade, and included in between the narrator's vignettes are a number of descriptions of the skinning, housing and feeding of the foxes, as well as her role in such things.

The narrator, who remains unnamed throughout the entire story, is a farm girl through and through. She is most at home doing the outside work, helping her father with the chores of raising foxes and keeping the outdoors in order...