Little foxes

FOXFIRE: Confessions of a Girl Gang By Joyce Carol Oates (Macmillan, $255) THERE is something immensely unsettling about the idea of girl gangs. They conjure up pictures of groups of sexy Suzie Quatro look-a-likes strutting around, causing God-fearing citizens to tut-tut loudly in disgust.

Girl gangs seem threatening on every level. They challenge the sexual stereotype of the passive female. They threaten the superiority of the boy gangs who are confident in the belief that they have cornered the market in violence and intimidation and do not like the idea of being challenged by ''the weaker sex''.

In other words, Joyce Carol Oates has a subject rich in potential. For my money she is one of America's finest contemporary writers, whose reputation was rightly secured with You Must Remember This , another tale of adolescence.

Ms Oates tells her stories through the eyes of Madeleine Faith Writz, whose gang name is Maddy-Monkey, or simply Maddy. She is one of the first gang members and assigned the role of chronicler of FOXFIRE's affairs.

This device is a good one for presenting the story in an ordered form, but, thankfully, Ms Oates cheats and has Maddy adding her own observations which bring the story alive.

The members of FOXFIRE are poor whites growing up in upstate New York during the 50s, the period when the concept of being a teenager was being invented. They come from single parent families, seem destined for dead-end jobs and marriage and are desperatefor excitement - at least this is what they say.

However, as Ms Oates shows, what they are really looking for most of the time is a sense of identity and affection. ''FOXFIRE,'' says Maddy, ''was a true blood-sisterhood, our bond forged in loyalty, fidelity, trust, love.'' The gang members willingly surrender their family ties for the stronger bonds of loyalty they have created with FOXFIRE. At one stage they manage to rent a house and live together, creating an even stronger feeling of a new family.