Adhering to rules that prevent them from eating or going to the toilet in the surfers' presence, the girls manage to become members of a surfing gang from Sylvania and are assigned boyfriends but, to the boys, they are just sexual objects.

Many were scandalised, while others defended it as a feminist work,[3][4] with Germaine Greer calling it a "profoundly moral story".

[6] But Kylie Minogue spoke for many when she said, "I don't recall reading Puberty Blues so much as devouring it.

[8] In 1982, the novel was adapted to the film Puberty Blues directed by Bruce Beresford from a screenplay by Margaret Kelly.

[9] In 2012, the novel was adapted to the television series Puberty Blues, starring Ashleigh Cummings and Brenna Harding.