Book shelves · Emotional Truth Diaries

30 books for teens

For teenagers, and for parents who want to understand them. Books about fitting in and standing out, first love, loss, courage and whole new worlds.

30 books 12+ for teens & parents

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How to use it

Some books touch on grief, illness or violence. They’re written carefully, but they’re worth talking about together.

Being different, first love, finding your people.

1
A boy with a facial difference goes to school for the first time.
2
First love between two teenagers who meet at a support group.
3
A boy at boarding school, an unforgettable girl and a question about life’s labyrinth.
4
A girl with anxiety searches for a missing billionaire, and untangles her own thoughts.
5
Two misfits fall in love over comics and music in 1986.
6
A shy fan-fiction writer starts college without her twin sister.
7
A teenager wakes up in a different body every day, and falls in love.
8
After something happens at a party, a girl stops talking. A book about finding your voice.
9
A boy whose mother is very ill is visited by a monster who tells him stories.
10
A boy who sees the world his own way investigates the death of a neighbour’s dog.

Standing up, even when it’s hard.

11
A girl volunteers for a deadly show in place of her little sister.
12
In a world divided into factions, a girl doesn’t fit into any of them.
13
In a “perfect” society, a boy is chosen to hold the memories everyone else has forgotten.
14
A girl sees a police officer shoot her friend, and finds her voice.
15
Two teenage gangs, rich and poor, and the boys caught between them.
16
The new girl becomes the target of the whole class. A book about bullying.
17
A boy sent to a desert camp to dig holes, and the family curse behind it.
18
A rich family’s private island, a summer accident and a truth that hurts.
19
A boy wakes up with no memory in a glade surrounded by a deadly maze.
20
A brilliant girl with neglectful parents and a terrifying headmistress discovers her power.

Other worlds, and a few books for real life.

21
A boy finds out he is the son of a Greek god.
22
An orphan soldier discovers a rare power that could save her country.
23
Six outcasts plan an impossible heist.
24
A human girl at the court of the faeries wants power of her own.
25
A girl moves to a rainy town and falls in love with a vampire.
26
A girl finds a door to a “better” version of her home, where the parents have button eyes.
27
A lonely girl finds a hidden garden and brings it, and herself, back to life.
28
Adventures, mischief and a first crush on the banks of the Mississippi.
29
Self-development for teens in plain words: goals, friends, confidence.
30
A former student visits his dying teacher every Tuesday to talk about life.