Red kayak
Priscilla Cummings
Book summary
Brady’s friends are implicated in the fatal kayak incident, and Brady learns that he unwittingly gave them the idea for their prank. His reluctance to betray them conflicts with his sense of responsibility.
Explore
Type a book, author, topic, idea or reading experience.
Find a Book
Scan the ISBN, scan the front cover, or type what you know.
Combine filters when useful. Values show what a book addresses, not what it endorses.
Clear filtersRequests, popularity, awards and recommendations—not just age. A list is a starting point, not a suitability verdict.
Popular themes
Type to search the full theme index.
Fresh mix gives you a varied selection that stays steady while you browse, so returning from a guide does not reshuffle the page.
Priscilla Cummings
Brady’s friends are implicated in the fatal kayak incident, and Brady learns that he unwittingly gave them the idea for their prank. His reluctance to betray them conflicts with his sense of responsibility.
Donny Bailey Seagraves
The story centres on Daniel’s guilt and bereavement after a hunting accident kills his uncle. At home, his father’s drinking and temper add strain, while Daniel tries to find a way forward.
Recommendations
Choose a route in, then open only the collection you want. 1 collections · 1 books.
Subjects, worlds and interests to browse into.
A carefully curated collection of children’s books in which grief, bereavement or remembrance is central. Compare how each book handles loss, emotional intensity and continued connection before deciding what suits your child and family values.
1 bookJacqueline Wilson
Laurie Halse Anderson
This is an emotionally intense story about a teenager’s eating disorder, self-harm, grief and family relationships, with a thread of hope around recovery.
Linda Urban
A reflective story about Ruby’s grief and regret, with friendship tensions and a quirky town celebration alongside the serious feelings.
Jennifer L. Armentrout
This is a contemporary-feeling story about a teenager whose hopes for a pivotal school year are disrupted, leaving her to reckon with guilt and changed relationships.
Kristin Harmel
This is a grief-centred story about a student trying to move forward while feeling responsible for a family tragedy. Helping others offers Lacey a new focus, but the synopsis signals that it is not a simple or painless solution.
Amy Lukavics
This is a dark horror story combining a young person’s pregnancy and guilt with an ominous family move and unsettling stories about violence.
Gareth Thompson
This is a story of memory, friendship and finding ways to face painful experiences. Andy’s interest in daffodils and his work with Angie sit alongside the more difficult events in his life.
Stephanie True Peters
A football story in which Rocky tries to manage extra responsibilities while feeling responsible for a friend’s injury. Changing team roles and friendship tensions complicate his efforts.
Michelle Krys
This is a supernatural search-and-rescue story, with Indie’s witchcraft efforts failing and the search leading to a perilous alternate dimension.
Melanie Conklin
This is a family story about living with uncertainty and change, told through a child’s divided feelings. It may suit readers drawn to realistic stories about siblings, moving and making new connections.
M. Azmitia
This is an emotionally intense verse novel centred on a teenager’s grief after her twin’s suicide. Its strongest focus is inward: guilt, shame, family responses, cultural belonging and the consequences of losing control.
Daniel Nayeri
A paranormal school mystery driven by Thomas’s confusion, family upheaval and risky choices. Its humour may soften the tension, while attacks, blackouts and a mystery drug make the situation feel consequential.
Lauren Oliver
A tense, emotionally driven mystery about damaged family bonds, guilt and protection. Its fractured structure and multiple plot strands may appeal to readers who enjoy twists, though the mature material is substantial rather than incidental.
Susin Nielsen
A character-led story about grief, guilt and anxiety, balancing painful experiences with humour, friendship and a slowly developing first relationship. Petula’s movement towards connection is central, while Jacob and the therapy group bring different burdens and perspectives.
Jeanne Birdsall
Expect a warm family story with humour and emotional depth. Batty’s efforts to earn money, her singing talent and the changing relationships around her provide several strands beyond the central grief.
Deborah Wiles
This is a character-led story about a child whose unusual familiarity with funerals does not protect her from grief, friendship strain or difficult choices. Its tone combines humour with sadness and emotional upheaval.
Andrew Post
An imaginative, action-led science-fiction adventure built around odd powers, unusual companions and a dangerous quest. Its elaborate world and mysteries may appeal to persistent readers, though the journey is deliberately expansive.
Kat Cho
Choose this for supernatural intrigue, Korean folklore, a slow-developing romance and emotionally complicated family relationships. It combines action and mystery with characters who struggle with guilt, isolation, attachment and difficult choices.
Gena Showalter
A grief-heavy supernatural romance with visible danger, strong momentum and a newly invented zombie mythology. The story emphasises emotional intensity, attraction and discovery more than sustained classic horror or subtle psychological realism.
Patti Larsen
This is a child-centred ghost story about bereavement, relocation and friendship. Chloe’s investigation gradually links her own guilt with the ghost boy’s guilt, giving the supernatural mystery an emotional purpose.
Melody Carlson
This is a faith-centred teen novel about performing, friendship, relationships and emotional consequences. Chloe’s ambitions sit alongside questions about responsibility, attraction, guilt and whether her music should serve a spiritual purpose.
Gary Paulsen
A thoughtful story about how children’s curiosity can become humane attention. Its emotional centre is Carl’s dance, which makes hidden wartime suffering visible while preserving his dignity and complexity.
Tim Federle
This is a grief-centred coming-of-age story that uses sharp humour alongside painful family loss. It offers a gay teenager’s perspective on guilt, friendship, emotional connection, filmmaking and beginning to imagine life after bereavement.
Shannon Messenger
This is a high-stakes fantasy finale centred on rescue, resistance and changing loyalties. It offers alternating viewpoints, elemental powers, magical warfare and a romance shaped by separation, regret and difficult choices.
Maria Farrer
This is an emotionally charged story about bereavement, guilt and family pressure, with a relationship that draws Amber into trouble. Its suspense and changing impressions of characters may suit readers who welcome difficult feelings and revelations.
Laura Sebastian
A dark, plot-driven fantasy about surviving occupation and reclaiming identity, with court intrigue, resistance and magic. Its central journey from frightened captive to leader is accompanied by graphic brutality and morally difficult choices.
Graham McNamee
A tense, atmospheric mystery about responsibility and taking action, with an underground workplace, a threatening diary and a close friendship group balancing the darker material with humour.
Judy I. Lin
A tea-centred fantasy of competition, palace intrigue and family devotion. Ning’s search for a cure gives the plot emotional urgency, while brewing, tasting and reading ingredients become ways to investigate danger and negotiate power.
Lauren Henderson
Choose this for a brisk teen mystery with romance, social intrigue, secrets and danger. Its appeal lies in Scarlett’s investigation and the glamorous, melodramatic atmosphere rather than realism or quiet reflection.
Rutendo Tavengerwei
This is a serious, emotionally charged story about a boy seeking acceptance and a grandmother carrying painful memories. Its Zimbabwean settings and two connected personal histories foreground prejudice, fear, guilt and forgiveness.
Hannah Marshall
This is an emotionally tense story about two former friends facing grief and guilt after a tragedy. Its alternating viewpoints offer different perspectives on damaged trust, private struggles and the possibility of moving forward.
Emily Lloyd-Jones
A fast-moving futuristic spy thriller follows Augusta as she lives under a secret identity and confronts a violent hostage situation. Alongside action and humour, it explores family separation, responsibility after a fatal mistake, surveillance and the costs of technological progress.
Channelle Desamours
This offers atmospheric supernatural suspense, a mystery to unravel and a protagonist forced to face personal and communal secrets. It may suit readers who enjoy eerie settings, countdowns, twists and psychologically unsettling dilemmas.
Kerry Drewery
This is a serious historical novel about Hiroshima’s bombing and its long aftermath for one family. Its movement between prose, poetry and haiku gives the story a distinctive shape, while the paper cranes connect grief, promises and hope.
S. F. Williamson
This is an imaginative, politically charged fantasy for readers interested in languages, dragons and morally complicated loyalties. Vivien’s translation work opens onto family upheaval, rebellion, class divisions and a war whose human and dragon costs are visible.
Aisling Fowler
This is a fast-moving fantasy adventure centred on a fierce, guarded heroine. Expect a dangerous rescue journey, strange creatures, corrupted magic and evolving friendships, alongside a serious exploration of loss, guilt and anger.
Kate Francis
This is a contained survival mystery built around seven teenagers, hidden culpability and an escalating moral game. Its central appeal is likely the pressure of deciding whom to trust while the group’s secrets gradually shape the danger.
Jewell Parker Rhodes
This is a serious story about racial injustice, bereavement and responsibility. Its supernatural viewpoint lets Jerome observe the consequences of his death while the historical connection to Emmett Till broadens the story beyond one family.
Sophie Cameron
A fantastical mystery carries a grieving teenager through questions of compassion, identity and who gets to control another being’s story. The emotional centre is mother loss rather than the supernatural premise alone.
Jacqueline Wilson
This is a grief story with a supernatural or possibly imagined presence at its centre. Jade’s friendship with Vicky is loving but unequal, and recovery involves recognising control, facing guilt and accepting help.
Annelise Gray
A mythic sea adventure carries Phoebe through danger, quests and encounters with gods and monsters, while her real-world worries about Cass, memory and loss remain central.
Bill Wood
This is a horror mystery about survivors confronting a copycat killer who turns local legends and their past trauma into staged crimes. It offers suspense, friendship, queer romance and questions about who controls a traumatic story.
A. M. Dassu
This is a refugee journey told through Sami’s changing circumstances: a familiar life in Damascus gives way to displacement, danger and attempts to rebuild in England. Family bonds, guilt, anxiety, kindness and discrimination shape the experience.
Jack Mackay
A strongly atmospheric horror adventure centred on a young carer who must recognise danger, face frightening experiences and reconnect her family after bereavement. Its emotional focus is grief and resilience as much as supernatural menace.
Ravena Guron
A fast-moving, puzzle-led thriller built around a week of threats. It offers suspense, clues, red herrings and questions about why people conceal painful truths, with grief and past events shaping Kay’s return.
Ravena Guron
A fast-paced school murder mystery with an outsider detective, sharp humour and a retrospective voice. Alongside the investigation, it explores privilege, class, racism, guilt and the ways young women may be judged.
Gayle Forman
This is a supernatural family drama about a dead teenager’s unexpected return and its consequences. It offers emotionally serious reflection on grief, regret, identity, memory and the possibility of repair.
Showing the first 48 results. Add another category or theme to narrow the selection.
This is a grief story with a supernatural or possibly imagined presence at its centre. Jade’s friendship with Vicky is loving but unequal, and recovery involves recognising control, facing guilt and accepting help.