Weird Bildungsroman

Bildungsroman: A class of novel that depicts and explores the manner in which the protagonist develops morally and psychologically. These are examples which maybe a little different than your average coming of age novel.

Updated February 6, 2023
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Ender's game
Card, Orson Scott.
Paper Book
From New York Times bestselling author Orson Scott Card, Ender's Game--adapted to film in 2013 starring Asa Butterfield and Harrison Ford--is the classic Hugo and Nebula award-winning science fiction novel of a young boy's recruitment into the midst of an...
It
King, Stephen 1947-
Paper Book
It: Chapter Two--now a major motion picture! Stephen King's terrifying, classic #1 New York Times bestseller, "a landmark in American literature" (Chicago Sun-Times)--about seven adults who return to their hometown to confront a nightmare they had...
The lightning thief
Riordan, Rick
Paper Book
The #1 New York Times Bestseller | Now a series on Disney+ 12-year-old Percy Jackson discovers he is the son of Poseidon in the opener to the hilarious, fast-paced adventure fantasy series for young readers ages 10 and up The paperback edition of the...
We have always lived in the castle
Jackson, Shirley 1916-1965
Paper Book
Shirley Jackson's beloved gothic tale of a peculiar girl named Merricat and her family's dark secret Taking readers deep into a labyrinth of dark neurosis, We Have Always Lived in the Castle is a deliciously unsettling novel about a perverse, isolated, and possibly...
A wizard of Earthsea
Le Guin, Ursula K. 1929-2018
Paper Book
The first novel of Ursula K. Le Guin's must-read Earthsea Cycle. "The magic of Earthsea is primal; the lessons of Earthsea remain as potent, as wise, and as necessary as anyone could dream." (Neil Gaiman) Ged was the greatest sorcerer in Earthsea, but in his youth he was the reckless...
Swamplandia!
Russell, Karen 1981-
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST * The bravely imagined, wildly acclaimed debut novel from the author of Vampires in the Lemon Grove--about a thirteen year old girl who sets out on a mission through magical swamps to save her family. "Ms....
A prayer for Owen Meany : a novel
Irving, John 1942-
Paper Book
Owen Meany hits a foul ball while playing baseball in the summer of 1953 that kills his best friend's mother, an accident that Owen is sure is the result of divine intervention.
Inkheart
Funke, Cornelia 1958-
Paper Book
From internationally acclaimed storyteller Cornelia Funke, this bestselling, magical epic is now being reissued with a brand new cover in anticipation of the long-awaited fourth book in the series. One cruel night, Meggie's father reads aloud from a book called INKHEART-- and an evil ruler escapes...
Boy's life
McCammon, Robert R.
Paper Book
Robert McCammon delivers "a tour de force of storytelling" (BookPage) in this award-winning masterpiece, a novel of Southern boyhood, growing up in the 1960s, that reaches far beyond that evocative landscape to touch readers universally. Boy's Life is a richly...
Something wicked this way comes
Bradbury, Ray 1920-2012
Paper Book
Few American novels written this century have endured in th heart and mind as has this one-Ray Bradbury's incomparable masterwork of the dark fantastic. A carnival rolls in sometime after the midnight hour on a chill Midwestern October eve, ushering in Halloween a week before its time. A calliope...

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