What Are You Looking For?

A teen story that brings together debating, a first crush and a disagreement at home, with Phoebe facing the challenge of speaking up for herself as well as in competition.

A family’s car journey becomes a story about how racial prejudice changes the sisters’ experience of a trip they had anticipated with pride and excitement.

This is a socially engaged sports novel: football brings two North American teenagers into contact with marginalised local players, while different experiences of race, class and belonging become increasingly difficult to ignore.

This is an intense, visually symbolic story about shame, identity and survival. Its painful experiences are balanced by friendship and a hopeful possibility of acceptance, without suggesting that every difficulty has been resolved.

This is a lively historical novel about sisters navigating an emotionally distant mother while encountering Black Panther community work and racial injustice. Its strongest offering is the combination of distinct girl characters, family complexity and a child’s perspective on a changing society.

Expect an unusual war fantasy where friendship and chosen family matter amid occupation, bodily vulnerability and shifting loyalties. Its experimental form may reward patient readers, but the story’s violence and sexual exploitation are substantial.

This offers a politically charged fantasy about cross-community partnership, inherited divisions and the status of a future heir. Its appeal may lie in shapeshifter cultures, royal stakes and a quick-moving search involving concealed identities and tangled histories.

A reflective coming-of-age story about discovering family roots and negotiating more than one sense of home. Its strongest elements are relationships, vivid place-writing, cultural encounter and questions of identity.

This novel follows a mixed-heritage teenager negotiating family ties, cultural belonging and other people’s expectations. It offers a story about identity that places personal uncertainty alongside racial prejudice and changing relationships.

This is a visually told historical story about a young person treated as an outsider both outside and inside an internment camp. Its strongest offering is a personal route into prejudice, citizenship and belonging.

This offers an accessible introduction to a pioneering doctor and inventor, combining a poetic life story with scientific and historical detail. Its strongest appeal is the connection between personal ambition, medical discovery and wider questions of equality.

This is a mystery about discovering and confronting organised racism in a new community. It offers suspense, a young investigator and questions about how prejudice can be spread through technology and social networks.

This is a family-and-community story about cultural identity, belonging and resilience. Its period details, family interactions and humour sit alongside racism, economic pressure and the difficult work of translating between languages and expectations.

This is an emotionally intense, socially engaged story of young people facing bereavement, family instability, discrimination and addiction. Its perspective shifts and layered histories invite sustained attention, while compassion, accountability, faith and hope remain important strands.

This is a richly layered historical coming-of-age novel about a book-loving girl negotiating family duty, education, friendship and romance while a murder’s consequences reach into her community.

Expect a suspenseful mystery built around unreliable perspectives, teenage status and the question of whether Tasha’s near-drowning was an accident. The investigation gradually exposes strained friendships and hidden motives.

A stranger arrives by sea and is confined, mistreated and expelled as the islanders’ fear becomes hatred. Their final wall leaves a bleak image of exclusion rather than reconciliation.

A contemporary coming-of-age story about queer identity, family ties and friendship, told in verse through Kai’s perspective. Its social concerns sit alongside romance and everyday school life, while the ending’s handling of these strands remains only partly clear.

This is a character-led coming-of-age romance about uncertainty rather than a straightforward love story. Ellie’s relationships, creative ambitions, family life and friendships overlap, offering humour, emotional complication and culturally specific family tensions.

This is an adventure-led historical novel centred on Deaf community, sign language and human dignity, while exploring how inherited prejudice shapes relationships between communities.

This offers imaginative fantasy alongside sustained questions about Black identity, friendship, prejudice and self-determination. Its dual perspective gives Tavia and Effie distinct forms of identity exploration, though the opening may feel slow before the action intensifies.

This is a symbolic story about colours whose town becomes divided after one colour claims superiority. Friendship, mixing and cooperation challenge exclusion, making the book particularly useful for starting conversations about racism and belonging.

Expect lively, performative poems alongside serious real-world concerns. The collection can invite laughter, close attention to word choice and discussion about fairness, nature, animal treatment and how poetry communicates ideas.

This is an adventurous, emotionally charged fantasy combining dragons with Cold War intrigue. It follows danger, friendship, romance and hope while confronting racism, bereavement, political violence and the destructive consequences of power.

This is a serious memoir about a child navigating poverty, school exclusion, racism and violent home relationships. Alongside distressing experiences, it includes friendship, sibling joy, Abuela’s influence and moments of perseverance.

A richly imagined fantasy combines Arthurian legend, secret societies and demons with Bree’s investigation into her mother’s death. Its strongest offering is a Black protagonist navigating grief, power and contested history alongside diverse allies and difficult questions about inherited authority.

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.

This is a personal investigation into relatives who vanished during the Holocaust. Rosen follows clues, disappointments and discoveries, while poems and family materials give emotional and historical shape to what happened.

This is a high-stakes coming-of-age story about trying to become a K-pop star while navigating outsider status, friendship, romance and an industry that demands perfection. Its setting offers a close look at training culture and the pressures surrounding public success.

This is a socially engaged coming-of-age story about belonging, prejudice and resistance. Its emotional centre is Zara’s effort to protect her family and future while remaining true to her identity and connected to people who support her.

A dark, atmospheric Dracula retelling centred on two sisters, captivity and resistance. Its strongest offering is the way female relationships, Traveller identity and collective courage reshape a familiar vampire story.

A nature-rich memoir that follows a young birder’s family travels and growing public activism. Its strongest interest may lie in the way birdwatching connects personal identity, family life, conservation and a search for belonging.

This is a character-led story about a Deaf teenager using graffiti and art to express herself while navigating exclusion, friendship and the expectations of hearing people.

Expect a tense mystery driven by anonymous messages, exposed secrets and changing alliances. The book combines a fast-moving school thriller with commentary on racism, privilege and the pressures placed on marginalised students.

A thoughtful historical coming-of-age story about desire, identity, family loyalty and imagined futures. Lily’s romance unfolds alongside Chinese American community life, scientific ambition and the pressures of 1950s racism, homophobia and anti-Communist suspicion.

This is an adventurous wartime mystery centred on Mary’s language work, secret assignments and shifting loyalties. Its suspense comes from the uncertainty surrounding her operation.

This is a socially engaged Manchester story about three Black teenagers whose lives become connected after a stabbing. Its central interest lies in contrasting viewpoints, unequal experiences and the friendships formed in the aftermath.

A warm, issue-rich coming-of-age romance about being seen honestly within family, faith and school life. Its humour and friendships sit alongside serious questions about racism, homophobia and cultural ownership.

A coming-of-age story about identity, belonging and disclosure, balancing painful social pressures with friendship, family love and romantic possibility. It offers a queer Mexican American protagonist whose choices are shaped by school, faith and immigration-related family separation.

A suspenseful historical coming-of-age story about friendship, fear and noticing injustice. Its child’s-eye investigation opens onto difficult adult realities, while humour, community details and emotional relationships give the darker subject matter human texture.

This is a dark, psychologically charged supernatural horror story about a teenager whose ability to see the dead brings him into contact with a powerful, vengeful ghost. Identity and control appear central alongside fear.

A story of sporting ambition and family inheritance, shaped by segregation and racial prejudice. Its verse form brings rhythm to Charley’s determination, while historical danger and a consequential choice give the narrative emotional weight.

This offers a lively, personal story about cultural and family pressures, school belonging and wanting independence. Humour sits alongside increasingly serious material, so the emotional experience may change notably as Jo grows older.

A richly atmospheric story about a hidden garden and friendship. Its movement from selfishness towards care sits alongside bereavement, illness, colonial prejudice and older attitudes that may need thoughtful discussion.

This is a powerful but deeply distressing story about a child enduring abuse and isolation, with friendship providing moments of refuge. Its suspense comes from the gradual disclosure of what happened after.