Being a teen girl isn’t easy. Not only do they have to face the perils of hormonal changes and growth spurs, but they also sit at the uncomfortable middle point of no longer being a child yet still having a long way to go until adulthood.
However, books remain a welcome escape from the chaos for those who seek them.
That is why we bring forward ten good books for teen girls—whether they dream of magical worlds or yearn for an introduction to complex topics and ideas. These masterpieces will comfort, challenge, or nurture the ideas of young bookworms everywhere.
Planet Middle School
Best for: Young girls just entering puberty and their teenage years.
One day, 12-year-old Joylin Johnson is happy, playing basketball and spending time with her friends Jake and Kaylee. However, everything changes suddenly—her body is different, boys look kind of cute, and Kaylee is acting strange.
What happened? Joylin doesn’t know, but she speculates she may be in Planet Middle School—a world very different from hers.
Written in free-verse poems penned by Joylin, Planet Middle School is a good book for teen girls navigating the changing world around them through the eyes of the protagonist.
Grow
Best for: Teenagers navigating online circles and sociopolitical issues.
Josh’s life changed forever after a terrorist attack took his father’s life. While navigating his emotions, a group with extremist views approaches Josh at his lowest point.
Grow is a book about grief, vulnerability, and how dangerous groups with equally dangerous ideas could exploit inner turmoil and anger. It tackles current topics and growing concerns, such as discrimination, racism, Islamophobia, extremism, violence, and revenge.
Although not an easy read, Grow is an essential book for teen girls and boys alike, showcasing the subtle emotional manipulation tactics employed by ill-intentioned people.
Animal Farm
Best for: Teen girls yearning to understand sociopolitical complexities and historical nuance.
Published in 1945, Animal Farm is a political satire text barely disguised as a fable. It follows the titular animal farm as the anthropomorphic animals start a revolution against their exploitation by humans.
A thinly-veiled retelling of the Russian Revolution of 1917 and its aftermath, it doesn’t shy away from using allegorical representations of Joseph Stalin, Vladimir Lenin, and many more figures and sociopolitical groups within the Soviet Union.
What makes Animal Farm a good book for teen girls is its fantastic role as an introductory read for complex historical and political movements.
Little Women
Best for: Teen girls who enjoy classic tales or love stories about sisterhood.
The March sisters are growing in hard times. Their father left to fight in the American Civil War, leaving them and their mother to their own devices. Luckily, they have each other to navigate the ups and downs of adolescence.
Young girls reading Little Women can see themselves reflected in the pages when they read about the tomboyish Jo, gentle Beth, motherly Meg, or spirited Amy. The March sisters are friends, confidants, and allies in the journey to maturity.
A timeless classic, Little Women is the quintessential coming-of-age story for young girls within American Literature.
The Catcher in the Rye
Best For: Older teens trying to find meaning in the world and capable of critically dissecting complex themes.
Holden Caulfield is a solitary teen in a populated world. He has just been expelled from his boarding school, so he decides to wander around New York City, encountering different situations and people that make him contemplate his values and what he considers essential in the world.
Another timeless example of coming-of-age literature, The Catcher in the Rye explores the feelings of solitude, identity, and teenage inadequacy. What makes it a good book for teen girls is the ability to explore Holden’s insight and, in turn, help readers find meaning in their introspection.
The Fault in Our Stars
Best for: Young adults unafraid of tragedy sprinkled in their romance novels.
A beautiful and poignant love story, The Fault in Our Stars follows the twists in the lives of Hazel and Augustus, two teenagers who meet in a cancer support group. They bond over their shared circumstances and love of literature, embarking on a journey that will change them forever.
The Fault in Our Stars is a raw and heart-wrenching book that threads between hope for the future and the fragility of life. It deals with upsetting themes, so it’s not recommended for readers who wish to avoid a tear or two.
Prep
Best for: Fans of academia, preppy aesthetics, and coming-of-age stories.
Lee Fiora, a witty lower middle-class young lady from Indiana, has received a scholarship to attend a prestigious boarding school in Massachusetts. But upon arriving at Ault School, she finds that the exclusive, elite campus filled with old-school affluence may not be as picturesque as she expected.
Prep is a coming-of-age story that approaches teen angst with the same sharpness it uses to address class differences. Lee navigates the complexities of a new environment through each page, creating a vivid picture of the unusual happenings of Ault School.
To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before
Best for: Teen girls with a taste for sweet romance books and fake dating tropes.
Lara Jean loves writing unsent love letters to all her crushes, past and present. One day, they mysteriously disappeared from her box. Things go from bad to worse when the guys start approaching her about the love letters they received.
To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before is a young adult romance that follows Lara Jean, her dreams, goals, and interpersonal relationships derived from the mysterious sending of her hidden-away letters.
It is a good book for teen girls yearning for dreamy romances—and has two more sequels worth checking out.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone
Best for: Those who enjoy fiction, world-building, and immersive magical adventures.
The adventures of The Boy Who Lived are as well-known worldwide as the silhouette of the bespectacled young boy with a lightning scar on his forehead.
Crafted by the pen of J.K. Rowling, the Harry Potter books follow the adventures of the titular character—a young orphan boy who receives a letter on his 11th birthday inviting him to join the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
Spanning seven books,Harry Potter became a cultural phenomenon that shaped a generation and continues to captivate young and old with whimsical world-building and heart-wrenching storytelling.
The Giver
Best For: Enthusiasts of young adult dystopias.
Before The Hunger Games, there was The Giver.
Probably one of the first dystopian novels unambiguously aimed at a teen and young adult audience, The Giver is a fascinating look at the fine line between utopias and dystopias and the cost of surrendering pain.
Jonas is a young boy living in a seemingly perfect world with no sadness, pain, crime, or suffering at the cost of sacrificing any joie de vivre. However, Jonas is different—he has been chosen to be the new Memory Keeper, the sole being who sustains society by receiving all the positive and negative memories of the past.
Good Books for Teen Girls: Conclusion
Many people are condescending toward young girls’ literary interests, assuming their reading habits are vapid and inconsequential. Of course, that’s nothing further from the truth.
Young women enjoy reading about old romances, dystopias, political criticism, poetry, and crime. They love non-fiction with the same intensity they have for dark academia and classic literature. As such, any age-appropriate book is a good book for teen girls.
The books in this list are well-known to be successful with the young adult target audience. Still, it’s all a matter of tastes—whether it is Percy Jackson or The Bell Jar, a teen girl somewhere in the world loves it to pieces.
