You're right, I guess "overly masculine" is the core of what I didn't understand. I don't know what that means, and while I can imagine someone being disappointed if they couldn't find any books with masculine characters and themes (which I think we agree are not hard to find, even among award nominees), I can't imagine someone finding those but thinking "but these aren't overly masculine, that's what I want". If you have some examples other than Cormac McCarthy books I think it would help explain the concept.