Books For Your Average Teen (Or Teen At Heart)
Discover the best books for your average teen (or teen at heart)! Explore our curated list of relatable, engaging, and must-read novels perfect for young readers and nostalgic adults alike.
Book
Gossip Girl #1
by Cecily von Ziegesar
The wickedly funny first book in the #1 New York Times bestselling series that inspired the original hit CW show and the new series coming to HBO Max's Spring 2020 launch season (alongside hit series such as Pretty Little Liars and Friends). Welcome to New York City's Upper East Side, where my friends and I live, go to school, play, and sleep--sometimes with each other. S is back from boarding school, and if we aren't careful, she's going to win over our teachers, wear that dress we couldn't fit into, steal our boyfriends' hearts, and basically ruin our lives in a major way. I'll be watching closely... You know you love me. gossip girl
Book
Sloppy Firsts
by Megan McCafferty
Devastated when her best friend moves away, sixteen-year-old Jessica Darling feels isolated at school and at home, as she struggles to deal with her father's obsession with her track meets, her boy-crazy peers, and her own nonexistent love life.
Item Not Found
ID: 0763619582
(Type: books)
Book
Define "Normal"
by Julie Anne Peters
From National Book Award Finalist Julie Anne Peters This thoughtful, wry story is about two girls--a "punk" and a "prep"--who find themselves facing each other in a peer-counseling program and discover that they have some surprising things in common. A new reading-group guide written by the author is included in the back of this paperback edition.
Book
Speak
by Laurie Halse Anderson
Laurie Halse Anderson's award-winning, highly acclaimed, and controversial novel about a teenager who chooses not to speak rather than to give voice to what really happened to her marks ten years in print with this special anniversary edition. Bonus material created for this edition includes a new introduction and afterword from the author, resources, and discussion guide. Will also include a preview of Anderson's newest book, Wintergirls. The quintessential edition for all fans of this powerfully moving book.
Book
Stargirl
by Jerry Spinelli
ONE OF TIME MAGAZINEâS 100 BEST YA BOOKS OF ALL TIME ⢠NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A modern-day classic from Newbery Medalist Jerry Spinelli, this beloved celebration of individuality is now an original movie on Disney+! And don't miss the author's highly anticipated new novel, Dead Wednesday! Stargirl. From the day she arrives at quiet Mica High in a burst of color and sound, the hallways hum with the murmur of âStargirl, Stargirl.â She captures Leo Borlockâ s heart with just one smile. She sparks a school-spirit revolution with just one cheer. The students of Mica High are enchanted. At first. Then they turn on her. Stargirl is suddenly shunned for everything that makes her different, and Leo, panicked and desperate with love, urges her to become the very thing that can destroy her: normal. In this celebration of nonconformity, Newbery Medalist Jerry Spinelli weaves a tense, emotional tale about the perils of popularity and the thrill and inspiration of first love. Donât miss the sequel, Love, Stargirl, as well as The Wardenâs Daughter, a novel about another girl who can't help but stand out. âSpinelli is a poet of the prepubescent. . . . No writer guides his young characters, and his readers, past these pitfalls and challenges and toward their futures with more compassion.â âThe New York Times
Book
Shade's Children (rack)
by Garth Nix
The Key to Survival Rests in the Hands of Shade's Children In a futuristic urban wasteland, evil Overlords have decreed that no child shall live a day past his fourteenth birthday. On that Sad Birthday, the child is the object of an obscene harvest resulting in the construction of a machinelike creature whose sole purpose is to kill. The mysterious Shade -- once a man, but now more like the machines he fights -- recruits the few children fortunate enough to escape. With luck, cunning, and skill, four of Shade's children come closer than any to discovering the source of the Overlords' power -- and the key to their downfall. But the closer the children get, the more ruthless Shade seems to become ...
Book
Red Scarf Girl
by Ji-li Jiang
In 1966 Ji-li Jiang turned twelve. An outstanding student and leader, she had everything: brains, the admiration of her peers, and a bright future in Chinaâ˛s Communist Party. But that year Chinaâ˛s leader, Mao Ze-dong, launched the Cultural Revolution, and everything changed. Over the next few years Ji-li and her family were humiliated and scorned by former friends, neighbors, and co-workers. They lived in constant terror of arrest. Finally, with the detention of her father, Ji-li faced the most difficult choice of her life. Told with simplicity and grace, this is the true story of one familyâ˛s courage and determination during one of the most terrifying eras of the twentieth century. Ages 11+
Book
Shabanu
by Suzanne Fisher Staples
When eleven-year old Shabanu, the daughter of a nomad in the Cholistan Desert of present-day Pakistan, is pledged in marriage to an older man whose money will bring prestige to the family, she must either accept the decision, as is the custom, or risk the consequences of defying her father's wishes.
Book
Homeless Bird
by Gloria Whelan
Gloria Whelan's National Book Awardâwinning novel, chronicles the breathtaking story of a remarkable young woman who dares to defy fate. Like many girls her age in India, thirteenâyearâold Koly faces her arranged marriage with hope and courage. But Koly's story takes a terrible turn when in the wake of the ceremony, she discovers she's been horribly misled; her life has been sold for a dowry. In prose both graceful and unflinching, this powerful novel relays the story of a rare young woman, who even when cast out into a brutal current of timeâworn tradition, sets out to forge her own remarkable future.Inspired by a newspaper article about the real thirteenâyearâold widows in India today, this universally acclaimed bestâselling novel, characterized by spare, lyrical language and remarkable detail, transports readers into the heart of a gripping tale of hope. Ages 10+
Book
The Catcher in the Rye
by J.D. Salinger
The "brilliant, funny, meaningful novel" (The New Yorker) that established J. D. Salinger as a leading voice in American literature--and that has instilled in millions of readers around the world a lifelong love of books. "If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth." The hero-narrator of The Catcher in the Rye is an ancient child of sixteen, a native New Yorker named Holden Caufield. Through circumstances that tend to preclude adult, secondhand description, he leaves his prep school in Pennsylvania and goes underground in New York City for three days.
Item Not Found
ID: 0440229219
(Type: books)
Book
The Gospel According to Larry
by Janet Tashjian
Seventeen-year-old Josh, a loner-philosopher who wants to make a difference in the world, tries to maintain his secret identity as the author of a web site that is receiving national attention.
Item Not Found
ID: 0439286034
(Type: books)
Book
Flipped
by Wendelin Van Draanen
A classic he-said-she-said romantic comedy! This updated anniversary edition offers story-behind-the-story revelations from author Wendelin Van Draanen. The first time she saw him, she flipped. The first time he saw her, he ran. That was the second grade, but not much has changed by the seventh. Juli says: âMy Bryce. Still walking around with my first kiss.â He says: âItâs been six years of strategic avoidance and social discomfort.â But in the eighth grade everything gets turned upside down: just as Bryce is thinking that thereâs maybe more to Juli than meets the eye, sheâs thinking that heâs not quite all he seemed. This is a classic romantic comedy of errors told in alternating chapters by two fresh, funny voices. The updated anniversary edition contains 32 pages of extra backmatter: essays from Wendelin Van Draanen on her sources of inspiration, on the making of the movie of Flipped, on why sheâll never write a sequel, and a selection of the amazing fan mail sheâs received. Awards and accolades for Flipped: SLJ Top 100 Childrenâs Novels of all time IRA-CBC Childrenâs Choice IRA Teacherâs Choice Honor winner, Judy Lopez Memorial Award/WNBA Winner of the California Young Reader Medal âWe flipped over this fantastic book, its gutsy girl Juli and its wise, wonderful ending.â â The Chicago Tribune âVan Draanen has another winner in this eighth-grade âhe-said, she-saidâ romance. A fast, funny, egg-cellent winner.â â SLJ, Starred review âWith a charismatic leading lady kids will flip over, a compelling dynamic between the two narrators and a resonant ending, this novel is a great deal larger than the sum of its parts.â âPublishers Weekly, Starred review
Book
Fever 1793
by Laurie Halse Anderson
An epidemic of fever sweeps through the streets of 1793 Philadelphia in this novel from Laurie Halse Anderson where "the plot rages like the epidemic itself" (The New York Times Book Review). During the summer of 1793, Mattie Cook lives above the family coffee shop with her widowed mother and grandfather. Mattie spends her days avoiding chores and making plans to turn the family business into the finest Philadelphia has ever seen. But then the fever breaks out. Disease sweeps the streets, destroying everything in its path and turning Mattie's world upside down. At her feverish mother's insistence, Mattie flees the city with her grandfather. But she soon discovers that the sickness is everywhere, and Mattie must learn quickly how to survive in a city turned frantic with disease.
Book
The Da Vinci Code
by Dan Brown
Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon and French cryptologist Sophie Neveu work to solve the murder of an elderly curator of the Louvre, a case which leads to clues hidden in the works of Da Vinci and a centuries-old secret society.
Book
The Thief Lord
by Cornelia Funke
Orphaned brothers Prosper and Bo, having run away from their cruel aunt and uncle, decide to hide out in Venice where they fall in with the Thief Lord, a thirteen-year-old boy who leads a crime ring of street children.
Book
The Chronicles of Chrestomanci
by Diana Wynne Jones
In this multiple parallel universes of the Twelve Related Worlds, only an enchanter with nine lives is powerful enough to control the rampant misuse of magic--and to hold the title Chrestomanci... The Chants are a family strong in magic, but neither Christopher Chant nor Cat Chant can work even the simplest of spells. Who could have dreamed that both Christopher and Cat were born with nine lives--or that they could lose them so quickly?
Item Not Found
ID: 0060594330
(Type: books)
Book
In the Forests of the Night
by Amelia Atwater-Rhodes
By day, Risika sleeps in a shaded room in Concord, Massachusetts. By night, she hunts the streets of New York City. She is used to being alone. But someone is following Risika. He has left her a black rose, the same sort of rose that sealed her fate 300 years ago. Three hundred years ago she was human. Now she is a vampire, a powerful one, and her past has come back to torment her.