Book suggestions for teenage girls

Cafe Society
21

I was reading adult literature when I was a teenager, there not being much young adult fiction published in the 1970s. I read a lot of bestsellers (Jonathan Livingston Seagull, Love Story, The Thorn Birds) and a lot of junk (Jacqueline Susann, Sidney Sheldon) but I did get my hands on some decent books.

I few that I enjoyed were —
Roots (the miniseries aired when I was around 13 or 14);
Sophie’s Choice
The Godfather
Ragtime
Watership Down
The World According to Garp
Interview with the Vampire
Carrie (and numerous other and subsequent Stephen King)

I also read The Exoricist, but certainly YMMV on that one. :eek:

22

No, this isn’t funny, at all. This is a thread about books for young women/girls and it’s a gross and shitty thing to say. Do you pay attention to the news at all? Don’t do it again.

23

For the older girl:

The Winner’s Trilogy, by Marie Rutkoski, starting with The Winner’s Curse. All three books are quite good, with a main character who is actually very smart, if flawed.

The first in the Great Library series by Rachel Caine, Ink and Bone. I haven’t read further in the series yet, so I can’t say if it will hold up, but I think this has a lot to offer a Harry Potter fan, though it is for an older reader.

The Denton Little duology, by Lance Rubin, starting with Denton Little’s Deathdate. Very very funny fantasy/sf that is perfect for older teens.

And for more traditional fantasy, The Cursed Kingdoms trilogy by Emily Gee, starting with The Sentinel Mage.

For the younger girl:

The Tillerman Cycle, by Cynthia Voigt, starting with Homecoming.

I Capture the Castle, by Dodie Smith. A great classic epistolary novel.

And the related The Montmaray Journals, by Michelle Cooper, starting with A Brief History of Montmaray. It’s about a fictional kingdom during WWII. Really good, I think, for people who are interested in history.

The Ruby Oliver books by E. Lockhart, starting with The Boyfriend List: 15 Guys, 11 Shrink Appointments, 4 Ceramic Frogs and Me, Ruby Oliver. Just a spectacular series for younger teens that explores dating, friendship, families, and school.

Seconding Uprooted and the Lockwood & Company novels, too.

24

Allow me to once again suggest the Skulduggery Pleasant series by Derek Landy. Potter-like, in that they involve a young person learning that there is a hidden world of magic; un-Potter-like, in that the protagonist is a girl, is the companion to a detective who is an animated skeleton, and gets in loads and loads of fights, sometimes losing quite badly. Set in Ireland, loads of humor. I seriously cannot recommend this series highly enough.

25

Very much seconded. I would think the age would suit the younger girl more than the older, though I think they are loads of fun no matter what age.

26

My 13 year old just read The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian cover to cover today. 230 pages in the hardback. It’s the first time she has EVER devoured a book. So, I highly recommend it.

It is kinda like diary of a wimpy kid grown into young adult fiction. Also semi-autobiographical. I just read a few random pages. It’s golden. I wish I had had it on the plane back from Hong Kong today and I would have read it cover to cover.

27

Well, an “unauthorized” biography might work, as opposed to a hagiography. Especially if the writer is skillful enough to make it serve as a warning to young women as opposed to salacious.

28

If she enjoyed Hidden Figures, she’ll also likely appreciate Rise of the Rocket Girls: The Women Who Propelled Us from Missiles to the Moon to Mars, by Nathalia Holt. It’s about women who worked at the Jet Propulsion Lab. One of them was African-American, and her story reminded me of Hidden Figures.

By the way, this thread has some great suggestions. I’ve just made a note to read a couple of books from it.

29

Anything by Rin Chupeco, Sarah Rees Brennan, and T. Kingfisher. Patricia Wrede is good, and there are few, if any writers out there who are better than Patricia McKillip.

Dendarii Dame, I’m making notes, too.

30

For either or both of them:

The Prince by Nicolo Machiavelli
The Art Of War by Sun Tzu
The Lucretia Borgia Cookbook.

31

Well, I’ve placed the order a few days ago now, so the suggestions won’t help me much, but feel free to continue. If nothing else, maybe I’ll look back in on this thread this time next year.

32

what did you choose?

mc

33

Good choice! I would recommend the His Dark Materials series.

34

I thought of this thread when I ran across this site that makes t-shirts with book texts: Litographs | Victoria Aveyard

35

“Are You There, God? It’s Me, Margaret.”

36

+1

Oh, anything Judy Blume. Those books might be dated now. But I loved them and they were edgy for their time. I did a biography on her in 4th grade and people raised all kinds of hell about the topics she dared to write about.

37

When I was in primary school there was a bit of a delicate issue of a girl doing an oral book report on Are You There God, It’s Me, Margaret.

38

One of the most banned writers of her time. Topics included religion, puberty, bullying, being Jewish, disability, sexual abuse and gasp teenage girls choosing to have sex.

Really one of my early heroes.

39

And chelophagy.

40

If she liked Failure Is Not An Option and Hidden Figures, she has to read The Right Stuff. It’s the definitive book about the beginning of the space program, and Tom Wolfe’s storytelling style is so engaging and entertaining. In addition to describing the people and the technology involved, it also describes all the hype and publicity surrounding it as well, and the political context of it. It is a classic book! The movie is pretty good but doesn’t even begin to approach the level of informational detail or character detail of the book.