I have a bit of an obsession with young adult novels. Even now that I'm almost 20 they're the majority of what I read. I'm sure some people would say that I should maybe find something more appropriate for my age but to be honest, young adult books normally have better messages than adult fiction books in my opinion. They have strong characters, romance, and interesting worlds in which they live. Even though there are tons of wonderful YA novels out there, here are the five that I would say are my favorites:
1. All The Bright Places by Jennifer Niven
This book is one of the most thought-provoking books I have ever read. It follows Violet and Theodore Finch who both have bouts of depression. They meet during quite an unhappy experience but quickly become friends and eventually romantic interests. For a class project, they decide to travel all over their state and find some locations that people would otherwise ignore. This book is a great read that shows the beauty in small things and how lives are sometimes taken too soon. However, I will add a trigger warning for anyone with depression.
2. Dash and Lily's Book of Dares by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan
A wonderful book if you need a good laugh or if you love suspense. The book is narrated by both Dash and Lily and starts with Dash looking through books in a library, on one of the shelves he encounters a journal written by Lily herself that leads Dash on a little adventure. The whole book continues on with Dash and Lily's little adventures for each other. Good
if you want a light, short read.
3. Olive's Ocean by Kevin Henkes
I've read this book multiple times and each time I learn something new from it. The book follows Martha who learns in the first chapter that her classmate Olive has died. She knew relatively nothing about her but still grieves over her death, wondering how it would've been if they had been friends. Martha goes on vacation with her
family to her favorite place, the ocean, and visits with her grandma learns about boys and wonders about the friend that could've been.
4. Everything, Everything by Nicola Yoon
Madeline is allergic to the outside world. She has never left her house in seventeen years. The only people she encounters every day are her mother and her nurse. She's perfectly fine with her condition,
reading,
writing, playing games, and
talking to her mother for entertainment when one day a boy moves next door, and she realizes that maybe a life confined isn't a life at all.
5. So B. It by Sarah Weeks
This book follows a girl named Heidi who has a mentally disabled mother. When Heidi was just a
baby she and her mother were found by their neighbor, Bernadette. Bernadette became Heidi and her mom's saving grace. The only problem is, Bernadette has agoraphobia or an intense fear of the outside world. The older Heidi gets, the more she wants to know where she came from. She has all kinds of questions: Why does her mama always say
soof? Who are the people she finds in the picture in the kitchen drawer? Can Heidi find her family and get answers?
