Michael Chabon believes that men are frauds. In Chabon's latest book, Manhood for Amateurs, rather than attacking the traditional characteristics attributed to masculinity – leader, hunter, and warrior – he argues that no man can fulfill them. All men fall short of ideal manliness. In the chapter style of Manhood, Chabon told us four stories about his experiences of acting masculine and he also defended himself for cooking for his family and carrying a "murse." Michael Chabon took a stand in his book and defend men's refusal to stop and ask for directions is a "foundational cliche of woman's criticism, analysis, and stand-up mockery of male behavior," and masculinity is becoming the discrimination of manhood.
Many of the accomplishments expected of a father and husband are almost beyond his capability, according to Chabon. He describes how, confronted with the job of installing towel racks at home, he picked up his electric drill and screwdriver, suspecting that he "may well have looked as if I knew what I was doing." He does install the towel rack, and the towels, he says, are hanging from it to this day, but "I fully expect, at any moment, in the dead of night, to hear a telltale clatter on the tiles." In "Faking It," Chabon asserts that men develop a knack for dissimulating competence in both practical and emotional matters. "This is an essential element of the business of being a man: to behave as if you have everything under your control even when you have just sailed your boat over the falls." Many women scorn the allegedly male trait of false assurance, and conscientious men resolve to avoid it. Chabon writes, "When I became a father, I made a promise to myself not to pretend to knowledge I did not possess, not to claim authority I plainly lacked, not to hide my doubts and uncertainties, my setbacks and regrets, from my children.
