This is the kind of middleweight book that regularly fills a niche in Australian publishing: densely footnoted but loosely argued, halfway between academic scholarship and pop journalism. Identifying herself as a relatively youthful member of ‘Generation X’ – born six years before this reviewer – Huntley adopts the tone of a concerned older sister, with more in common with her subjects than she seems to believe. Though she chides them for their embrace of consumerism and their lack of a ‘firm ethical framework’ (or, implicitly, a sense of history), she shares their base in contemporary media culture – uncritically citing American journalists such as David Brooks and happily illustrating her points with references to whatever she just saw on television.

Tellingly, apart from some comments on the decline of campus social life, Huntley has almost nothing to say about the Australian education system: as an influence on young minds, school presumably now runs a distant fourth to family, friends and Cleo magazine. On this analysis, the only remaining serious contender would be religion, particularly in the modernised forms of New Age spirituality and the Hillsong church. More detailed attention to a wider range of youth subcultures might not have clarified the broad-brush picture Huntley seeks to paint, but would certainly have made for a livelier read.