These aren’t my favorite YA books, but they are definitely ones that I think have a lot of crossover appeal and literary merit. Also a few of them might be considered closer to literary fiction than YA, but I think they would still make a great introduction to reading books about teenagers. Whether people like Game of Thrones, historical fiction, romance, or contemporary stories I think there is something for almost everyone on this list. Let me know in the comments which books you would suggest.
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- Why We Broke Up, by Daniel Handler and Maira Kalman
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- Will Grayson, Will Grayson, by John Green and David Levithan
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- The Lost Art of Keeping Secrets, by Eva Rice
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- The Book Thief, by Markus Zusak
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- Graceling, by Kristin Cashore
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- The Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins
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- Eleanor & Park, by Rainbow Rowell
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- The Fault in Our Stars, by John Green
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- Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe, by Benjamin Alire Saenz
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- The Impossible Knife of Memory, by Laurie Halse Anderson
Thanks to The Broke and the Bookish for hosting this weekly book meme.
I’ve already noticed several people choosing this topic (I did as well) and it is so interesting to see the differences between lists. I personally recommended a few books in a variety of specific genres with some titles including A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness, Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson, The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, and Sabriel by Garth Nix. I really like your list though – mostly books I haven’t read, but several I intend to get to soon.
I loved the way you organized your list! I haven’t read A Monster Calls or Sabriel yet, but both are on my radar!
Awesome topic! I’ve read 8/10 on your list so I’d have to agree these are the cream of the crop. The Book Thief is one that my mom, my daughter, and I all enjoyed. Aristotle & Dante is such a lovely book. Killer list!
Both of those books are such favorites of mine!
Ooooh, excellent list! There are so many on here that I either read and loved, or that I’ve heard amazing things about! Most notably Will Grayson, Will Grayson, which I thought was amazing.
Will Grayson, Will Grayson is one of my all-time favorites – especially the audio book. It is amazing!
Great list! I recommended Eleanor and Park to a friend who didn’t read YA and she liked it.
That’s probably the number one book I recommend to people who haven’t read YA.
We went for the same topic this week! 🙂 I agree with a lot of your choices. I have Eleanor & Park on my list too. I think adults would very much enjoy that book!
Me too!
Great list I’d recommend The fault in our stars to almost anyone!! 🙂
Me too! Especially before they see the movie!
Nice list! A good mixture of different reads. I’ve been thinking about reading The Fault In Our Stars for a while now as everyone keeps telling me how good it is.
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I would definitely recommend checking it out.
Great list. I’ve read about half of them but some of the others will probably make it onto my TBR list.
Thanks Michael! I love the way your organized your list!
Great list! I have been wanting to read Why We Broke Up, so I’m going to need to check that one out soon, I think. 🙂
My TTT is on dystopian fiction.
Definitely read it! The illustrations are amazing!
Great list! I could have used this about a year ago when I first ventured into YA!
Thanks Tiffany!
Great list. I love all the books on your list, except I’m not familiar with The Lost Art of Keeping Secrets. Your list similar to my list, I also included E&P, TFIOS, and THG.
The Lost Art of Keeping Secrets isn’t that well known but it is one of my favorites!
I would recommend The Book Thief to pretty much anyone in a heartbeat.
My TTT
Me too! I love your zombie list!
Is it sad that I own The Book Thief and Graceling but just haven’t had a chance to read them yet? Though to be fair, I did attempt The Book Thief and just wasn’t able to get into it, but I think I just need to be in the right mindset.
Yeah, I get that. I would give both of them a try!
I would swap out Graceling for the Night Circus and hunger games for chaos walking but otherwise yesyesyes to everything on this list – so glad you recommended all of these to me!
I wish I’d thought of Night Circus … I’m never exactly sure if it qualifies as YA . But that almost makes it even more perfect for this list!
Another excellent YA transfer to Adult reading market would be Angelfall and the sequel World After by Susan Ee – dystopian, paranormal about violent Angels and the End of days – MC is 17 year old girl called Penryn. Excellent, well written, edge of your seat stuff!
Thanks for the suggestions. I haven’t read those before!
I’ve read some of these and haven’t others. I’ve never heard of The Lost Art of Keeping Secrets, but it sounds good! And I LOVED Aristotle and Dante…. Soooooo good. Definitely my favorite book I’ve read this year. Great list! 🙂
Aristotle and Dante is one of my favorites from this year as well! Such good characters! I would definitely recommend The Lost Art of Keeping Secrets! It has really sweet characters and is set in 1950s London which I didn’t know that much about.
I honestly don’t know much about the 1950’s either.. Very interesting. I’m definitely interested in reading it!
I loved reading The Fault in Our Stars even though I found myself crying in certain scenes!! Checkout my TTT post for this week: http://captivatedreader.blogspot.com/2014/08/top-ten-tuesday-top-ten-books-id-give.html
I definitely cried a lot while reading TFiOS … most embarrassingly, when I finished the book while in the waiting room at a doctor’s office. I think all the other patients thought something was really wrong with me!
Ooh, you have some good looking books on there. I actually haven’t read many of these books, but they sound like a great place to start. I should read some of these famous books (I’m kind of terrible when it comes to the famous ones.)
Totally understand! If you want a rec on which one to start with let me know!
I completely agree with Aristotle and Dante and also The Book Thief. They’re actually really good YA novels, that have a much more deeper meaning than people think that they do. Actually, all of these books do!
Agreed! A lot of YA fiction is very literary and thought-provoking.