Books From Around the World (YA): Europe

It’s often interesting to get a different perspective on the world. Here are some books set in some far-flung places – and some places close to home – grouped by continent/large body of water with islands in it. The books on this list are (mostly) written by authors from the countries they are about, and in many cases have been translated into English from their mother tongues (the book we’ve chosen for Madagascar, Return to the enchanted island by Johary Ravaloson, is only the second book to have ever been translated from Malagasy into English!).

Not all of the books are in the Young Adult collection, but we’ve tried to make sure that they all at least feature kids or teens in prominent places in the story. Our eventual goal is to have at least one book for every country in the world! Help us out by sending in recommendations if you’ve found one we’ve missed!

This list contains books written by authors from Europe. Check out our lists for authors from Africa, Asia, North and Central America, Oceania, and South America for even more recommendations!

Updated June 19, 2024
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Wellington City LibrariesYouth team at Wellington City Libraries
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A dictator calls : a novel
Kadare, Ismail
Paper Book
Longlisted for the International Booker Prize The Wall Street Journal, A Best Book of the Year Using a sophisticated and literary version of the ever-popular game of telephone to examine the relationship of writers with tyranny, Ismail Kadare reflects on three particular...
Albania | Albanian author
Free : coming of age at the end of history
Ypi, Lea
Paper Book
Lea Ypi grew up in one of the most isolated countries on earth, a place where communist ideals had officially replaced religion. Albania, the last Stalinist outpost in Europe, was almost impossible to visit, almost impossible to leave. It was a place of queuing and scarcity, of political executions...

Albania | Albanian author

Emil and Karl
Glatstein, Jacob
Paper Book
Written in the form of a suspense novel, "Emil & Karl" draws readers into the dilemma faced by two young boys--one Jewish, the other not--when they suddenly find themselves without homes or families in Vienna on the eve of World War II. A taut, gripping page-turner, it offers a picture of life...

Austria | Polish-born Jewish author writing about Jewish life in Vienna prior to World War II

A song for summer
Ibbotson, Eva.
Paper Book
A lyrical historical romance for fans of The English Patient Eighteen-year-old Ellen never expected the Hallendorf school to be, well, quite so unusual. After all, her life back in england with her suffragette mother and liberated aunts certainly couldn't be called normal. but...

Austria | Austrian author

Threads that bind
Hatzopoulou, Kika
Paper Book
"Dripping with atmosphere and edged with danger, Threads That Bind weaves together a gorgeous dark tapestry of mystery, fated romance, and modern myth. You won't be able to put this one down." --Alexandra Bracken, New York Times bestselling author of Lore In...

Greece | Greek author

Today is the last day of the rest of your life
Lust, Ulli
Paper Book
Back in 1984, a rebellious, 17-year old and punked-out Ulli List set out for a wild hitchhiking trip across Italy, from Naples through Verona and Rome, ending up in Sicily. 25 years later, this talented Austrian cartoonist has looked back at that tumultuous summer and delivered a long, dense and...

Austria | Austrian author

Voices from Chernobyl : the oral history of a nuclear disaster
Aleksievich, Svetlana
Paper Book
Winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award On April 26, 1986, the worst nuclear reactor accident in history occurred in Chernobyl and contaminated as much as three quarters of Europe.Voices from Chernobyl is the first...

Belarus | Belarusian author

The diary of a young girl
Frank, Anne
Paper Book
One of the most moving and eloquent accounts of the Holocaust, read by tens of millions of people around the world since its publication in 1947. The Diary of a Young Girl is the record of two years in the life of a remarkable Jewish girl whose triumphant humanity in the...

The Netherlands | German-born author writing in the Netherlands during World War II

Music for the dead and resurrected
Mort, Valzhyna
Paper Book
WINNER OF THE INTERNATIONAL GRIFFIN PRIZE NAMED ONE OF THE BEST POETRY BOOKS OF 2020 BY The New York Times In her book of letters to the dead, the prize-winning poet Valzhyna Mort relearns how to mourn those erased by violent history. ...

Belarus | Belarusian poet

The city of Belgium
Evens, Brecht
Paper Book
An exquisitely drawn exploration of three lost souls' emotional terrain As night falls in the City of Belgium, three strangers in their late twenties--a most dangerous age--arrive at a popular restaurant. Jona is about to move away; he calls his wife, who's already settled in...
Belgium | Belgian author-illustrator
Die laughing
Franquin
Paper Book
Die Laughing, which is executed in stark black and white, takes aim at everyone and everything in its scathing critique of modern life, but is particularly ruthless toward animal abusers, the military industrial complex, and death penalty enthusiasts. Franquin's loose but meticulous line work...

Belgium | Belgian author-illustrator

The cat I never named : a true story of love, war, and survival
Sabic-El-Rayess, Amra
Paper Book
The stunning memoir of a Muslim teen struggling to survive in the midst of the Bosnian genocide--and the stray cat who protected her family through it all. *Six Starred Reviews*"Extraordinary." - Booklist | "A must-read." - School Library...

Bosnia and Herzegovina | Bosnian author

Street without a name : childhood and other misadventures in Bulgaria
Kassabova, Kapka.
Paper Book
After years on the outside, Bulgaria has finally made it into the EU club, but beyond the cliches about undrinkable plonk, cheap property, and assassins with poison-tipped umbrellas, the country remains a largely unknown quantity. Born on the muddy outskirts of Sofia, Kapka Kassabova grew up under...

Bulgaria | Bulgarian author

The Walnut Mansion
Jergovic?, Miljenko
Paper Book
An epic novel of twentieth-century Balkan life, from the decline of the Ottoman Empire through the bloodshed of the Bosnian War This grand novel encompasses nearly all of Yugoslavia's tumultuous twentieth century, from the decline of the Austro-Hungarian and...

Croatia | Croatian author

This way back
Eleftheriou, Joanna
"Winning and contemplative." --Kirkus Reviews (starred review)  Going back to her ancestral homeland, a Greek American girl discovers she is a lesbian in love with God, so her questions about home and belonging will not be easily answered. ...

Cyprus | Cypriot-American author

The island of missing trees
Shafak, Elif
Paper Book
A REESE'S BOOK CLUB PICK Winner of the 2022 BookTube Silver Medal in Fiction * Shortlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction "A wise novel of love and grief, roots and branches, displacement and home, faith and belief. Balm for our bruised times." -David...

Cyprus | Turkish author writing in the context of the Greek-Turkish conflict on the island of Cyprus

The unbearable lightness of being
Kundera, Milan
Paper Book
International Bestseller * Winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Fiction "Far more than a conventional novel. It is a meditation on life, on the erotic, on the nature of men and women and love . . . full of telling details, truths large and small, to which just about every...

Czechia | Czech author

The Devil's workshop
Topol, Ja?chym
Paper Book
A surreal, comic and disturbing novel about the horrors of history, the commodification of the past, and dark edges of the present.

Czechia | Czech author

The Marco effect : a Department Q novel
Adler-Olsen, Jussi
Paper Book
The New York Times and internationally bestselling author returns with an astonishing and sinister case for Department Q All fifteen-year-old Marco Jameson wants is to become a Danish citizen and go to school like a normal teenager. But his uncle Zola rules his former...

Denmark | Danish author

The willow king : the birds of the muses
Friedenthal, Meelis
Paper Book
In this astonishingly atmospheric novel, Friedenthal enters the bowels of Shakespeare's century to tell the story of anguished modernity, and of the advent of the Age of Enlightenment.

Estonia | Estonian author

The man who spoke Snakish
Kivira?hk, Andrus
Paper Book
A runaway bestseller in Europe where the book is so well known that a popular board game has been created based on it, The Man Who Spoke Snakish is an extraordinary coming-of-age story, mixing magical realism, reinvented national myth and satire.

Estonia | Estonian author

The book of hope
Musturi, Tommi
Paper Book
In a way that only the medium of comics can, The Book Of Hope slows the reader down to the rhythms of the silent life of a retired couple living in a rural countryside. Behind the static, routine moments of everyday life something bigger takes shape. A flash of encroaching death starts to consume...
Finland | Finnish author-illustrator
Maresi
Turtschaninoff, Maria
Paper Book
A world where girls live in fear. A safe haven far away. But is it far enough? This is Maresi's story.

Finland | Finnish author (originally written in Swedish)

You can't kill Snow White
Alemagna, Be?atrice
Paper Book
In this dark, genre-defying picture-book adaptation of Snow White, acclaimed artist Beatrice Alemagna tells the story from the point of view of the jealous stepmother queen, to complicate the question of goodness and set into high relief the shadow side, with its capacity...

France | French author-illustrator

Catherine's war
Billet, Julia
Paper Book
"A shining story of a young girl who struggles to come of age and find her place in a world fraught with danger." --Susan Campbell Bartoletti, Newbery Honor-winning author of Hitler Youth * Winner of the Youth Prize at the Angoulême International Comics Festival (voted by readers) * Winner...

France | French author

A winter's promise
Dabos, Christelle
Paper Book
Long ago, following a cataclysm called 'The Rupture', the world was shattered into floating celestial islands, known now as Arks. Ophelia lives on Anima, an Ark where objects have souls. Beneath her worn scarf and thick glasses, Ophelia hides two powers- the ability to read the past of objects and...

France | French author

The Count of Monte Cristo
Dumas, Alexandre
Paper Book
A beautiful new clothbound edition of Alexandre Dumas' classic novel of wrongful imprisonment, adventure and revenge. Thrown in prison for a crime he has not committed, Edmond Dantes is confined to the grim fortress of the Château d'If. There he learns of a great hoard of treasure hidden on the Isle...

France | French author

No and me
Vigan, Delphine de.
Paper Book
Lou Bertignac has an IQ of 160 and a good friend called Lucas who gets her through the school day. At home her father cries in secret in the bathroom and her mother hasn't been out of the house properly for years. But Lou is about to change her life - and that of her parents - for good, all because...

France | French author

Dream a little dream
Gier, Kerstin
Paper Book
Liv has been dealing with a lot lately. She and her family have just moved in with her mother's new boyfriend in London, and she's starting over (again) at a new school. But Liv isn't sure that explains her dreams, which have gone from odd to...well, bizarre. Lately, her nighttime hours have been...

Germany | German author

The book jumper
Gla?ser, Mechthild
Paper Book
Amy Lennox doesn't know quite what to expect when she and her mother pick up and leave Germany for Scotland, heading to her mother's childhood home of Lennox House on the island of Stormsay. Amy's grandmother, Lady Mairead, insists that Amy must read while she resides at Lennox House...

Germany | German author

My soul twin
Haratischwili, Nino
Paper Book
A modern-day Wuthering Heights from the author of international bestseller The Eighth Life. Two families, one devastating secret, and an epic story of forbidden love. Eight years have passed since Stella last saw Ivo, but when he returns, the reunion of their unconventional family...

Germany | Georgian-born German author

Golden boy : Beethoven's youth
Ross, Mikae?l
Paper Book
Master cartoonist Mikael Ross (The Thud) tells the story of Beethoven's years leading up to Beethoven's first major public appearance in Vienna in 1795. The Beethoven family lived a difficult life in Bonn. Only young Ludwig and his talent at the piano offer any hope for the future - if he would stop...

Germany | German author-illustrator

Back to Delphi
Karystiane?, Io?anna.
Paper Book
A mother's brief reunion with her imprisoned son is saturated in both love and menace in this complex and compelling novel. Linus has been granted a five-day furlough from prison, where he is serving a life sentence for murder. His mother has decided to take him to Delphi. A...

Greece | Greek author

The dispossessed
Borbe?ly, Szila?rd
Paper Book
"The Dispossessed is a great sui generis book that, for all its cultural differences, touches us deeply. We recognize it as tragic, truthful and visionary wherever we are." -- George Szirtes, New York Times Book Review This hypnotic, hauntingly beautiful first novel...

Hungary | Hungarian author

The rebels
Ma?rai, Sa?ndor
Paper Book
Embers . . . Casanova in Bolzano . . . and now The Rebels: the third of the rediscovered novels of the great Hungarian writer—the jolting story of a troubled group of young men on the cusp of life, and death, in World War I. It is the summer of 1918. As graduation...

Hungary | Hungarian author

Boy on the edge
Friðrik Erlingsson
Paper Book
Can a boy on the edge find his way back? From award-winning Icelandic author Fridrik Erlings comes a novel as cruel as it is tender. Henry has a clubfoot and he is the target of relentless bullying. One day, in a violent fit of anger, Henry lashes out at the only family he has --...

Iceland | Icelandic author

Moonstone : the boy who never was
Sjo?n
Paper Book
The mind-bending miniature historical epic is Sjón's specialty, and Moonstone: The Boy Who Never Was is no exception. But it is also Sjón's most realistic, accessible, and heartfelt work yet. It is the story of a young man on the fringes of a society that is itself at the fringes of the...

Iceland | Icelandic author

Bog child
Dowd, Siobhan.
Paper Book
Digging for peat in the mountain with his Uncle Tally, Fergus finds the body of a child, and it looks like she's been murdered. As Fergus tries to make sense of the mad world around him, a little voice comes to him in his dreams, and the mystery of the bog child unfurls.

Ireland | Irish author

The call
O? Guilin, Peadar
Paper Book
What if you only had three minutes to save your life and the clock is already counting down. Three minutes: you wake up alone in a horrible land. A horn sounds. You realize you've been Called. Two minutes: they're getting closer and despite all your training you're exhausted, you can't see anywhere...

Ireland | Irish author

The ta?in
Titley, Alan
Paper Book
A new translation of Ireland's national epic myth by award-winning author and Irish language expert Alan Titley. When Queen Maeve's army marches north to steal the Brown Bull of Cooley, the leaders of Ulster are cast under a sleeping spell. Just one boy...

Ireland | Irish author (retelling of 12th-century story of Irish legend)

We want everything : the novel of Italy's hot autumn
Balestrini, Nanni.
Paper Book
The explosive novel of Italy's revolutionary 1969 It was 1969, and temperatures were rising across the factories of the north as workers demanded better pay and conditions. Soon, discontent would erupt in what became known as Italy's Hot Autumn. A young worker from the...

Italy | Italian author

What hell is not
D'Avenia, Alessandro
Paper Book
  From the bestselling Italian author comes a novel based on the true story of a priest who refused to surrender... The school year is finished, exams are over and summer stretches before seventeen-year-old Federico, full of promise and opportunity. But then he accepts a...

Italy | Italian author

The solitude of prime numbers
Giordano, Paolo
Paper Book
As a child Alice's overbearing father drove her first to a terrible skiing accident, then to anorexia. When she meets Mattia she recognises a kindred spirit, and Mattia reveals to Alice that as a boy he left his mentally-disabled twin sister in a park and she disappeared forever. These episodes...

Italy | Italian author

Golem
LRNZ
Paper Book
Set in a future, post-Eurozone Italy, entrenched in a bizarre form of hyper-capitalism, GOLEM follows a young boy kidnapped during a political protest gone sour, who learns that he has the power to not only change the city, but reality itself. This intensely imaginative political-sci-fi graphic...

Italy | Italian author-illustrator

A Latvian Kiwi : a journey from war-ravaged Europe to the challenges of a new country
Elepans, Guntar John
Paper Book
The author was conscripted by the Germans to fight the Russians in World War 2. This is the story of his war-time experiences, and his life in New Zealand.

Latvia | Latvian-New Zealand author

Among the living and the dead : a tale of exile and homecoming on the war roads of Europe
Verzemnieks, Inara
Paper Book
"It's long been assumed of the region where my grandmother was born...that at some point each year the dead will come home," Inara Verzemnieks writes in this exquisite story of war, exile, and reconnection. Her grandmother's stories recalled one true home: the family farm left behind in Latvia,...

Latvia | Latvian author

When I grow up : the lost autobiographies of six Yiddish teenagers
Krimstein, Ken
Paper Book
An NPR Best Book of the Year A Washington Post Best Book of the Year A Chicago Tribune Fall "Best Read" An Alma most anticipated book of November From the prize-winning author of The Three Escapes of Hannah...

Lithuania | American-born author writing about Lithuanian Jewish teens on the brink of World War II, based on their recently-discovered diaries.

Between shades of gray
Sepetys, Ruta.
Paper Book
The inspiration for the major motion picture Ashes in the Snow! "Few books are beautifully written, fewer still are important; this novel is both." --The Washington Post From New York Times and international bestseller and Carnegie...

Lithuania | Lithuanian-American author

The letter for the king
Dragt, Tonke
Ebook
A NETFLIX ORIGINAL SERIES For fans of Tolkien-inspired fantasy and Arthurian mythos comes this prize-winning fantasy adventure about one knight's battle against evil It is the dead of night. Sixteen-year-old Tiuri must spend hours locked in a chapel in silent...

The Netherlands | Dutch author

On the edge of gone
Duyvis, Corinne
Paper Book
A thrilling, thought-provoking novel from one of young-adult literature's boldest new talents. January 29, 2035. That's the day the comet is scheduled to hit - the big one. Denise and her mother and sister, Iris, have been assigned to a temporary shelter outside their hometown of...

The Netherlands | Dutch author

Sophie's world
Gaarder, Jostein
Paper Book
The international bestseller about life, the universe and everything. 'A simply wonderful, irresistible book' DAILY TELEGRAPH 'A terrifically entertaining and imaginative story wrapped round its tough, thought-provoking philosophical heart' DAILY...

Norway | Norwegian author

172 hours on the moon
Harstad, Johan
Paper Book
Three teenagers are going on the trip of a lifetime. Only one is coming back. It's been more than forty years since NASA sent the first men to the moon, and to grab some much-needed funding and attention, they decide to launch an historic international lottery in which three...

Norway | Norwegian author

Lena, the sea and me
Parr, Maria.
Paper Book
A heartwarming and action-packed story of friendship from Norway's answer to Astrid Lindgren. This classic in the making from award-winning author Maria Parr is packed full of laugh-out-loud adventures and paints an honest picture of the highs and lows of friendship and growing up. Dark clouds are...

Norway | Norwegian author

Flights
Tokarczuk, Olga
Paper Book
WINNER OF THE NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE WINNER OF THE MAN BOOKER INTERNATIONAL PRIZE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST FOR TRANSLATED LITERATURE A visionary work of fiction by "A writer on the level of W. G. Sebald" (Annie Proulx) "A...

Poland | Polish author

Mr. Lightbulb
Wawszczyk, Wojtek
Paper Book
Our protagonist comes from a broken home. Quite literally. Freak accidents at the steelworks where his parents work have left his mom snapped and his dad flattened. One day, he mistakenly swallows a glob of molten metal giving himself the strange power to radiate heat and light - like a lightbulb....

Poland | Polish author-illustrator

The return
Cardoso, Dulce Maria
Paper Book
Everyone has gone away... We too should no longer be here. Luanda, 1975. The Angolan War of Independence has been raging for at least a decade, but with the collapse of the Salazar dictatorship, defeat for the Portuguese is now in sight. Thousands of settlers are fleeing back to...

Portugal | Portuguese author

A curse of roses
Pinguicha, Diana
Paper Book
Based on Portuguese legend, this #OwnVoices historical fantasy is an epic tale of mystery, magic, and making the impossible choice between love and duty... With just one touch, bread turns into roses. With just one bite, cheese turns into lilies. There's a famine...

Portugal | Portuguese author

Solenoid
Ca?rta?rescu, Mircea
Paper Book
WINNER of the Dublin Literary Award 2024 and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize 2022 NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF 2022 by the New Yorker, Publishers Weekly, The Financial Times, Words Without Borders A highly-acclaimed master work of...

Romania | Romanian author

The hunger angel : a novel
Mu?ller, Herta.
Paper Book
A masterful new novel from the winner of the 2009 Nobel Prize, hailed for depicting the "landscape of the dispossessed" with "the concentration of poetry and the frankness of prose" (Nobel Prize Committee) It was an icy morning in January 1945 when the patrol came for seventeen-year...

Romania | Romanian-German author

Anya's ghost
Brosgol, Vera.
Paper Book
Anya could really use a friend. But her new BFF isn't kidding about the "Forever" part . . . Of all the things Anya expected to find at the bottom of an old well, a new friend was not one of them. Especially not a new friend who's been dead for a century. Falling down a...

Russia | Russian-American author-illustrator

Other Russias
Lomasko, Viktoria
Paper Book
A remarkable graphic reportage on today's Russia, showing us the country as it's lived by its people What does it mean to live in Russia today? What is it like to grow up in a forgotten city, to be a migrant worker or to grow old and seek solace in the Orthodox church? For the past...

Russia | Russian author

Isolde
Odoevt?s?eva, Irina
Paper Book
The first English translation of a pioneering Russian writer: a hypnotically dark classic of love, deceit and wayward youth in Paris

Russia | Russian author

Gamayun tales I : an anthology of modern Russian folktales
Utkin, Alexander
Paper Book
Enter a world of magic and adventure in this stunning series based on traditional Russian folklore. Collected into a beautiful new paperback edition for the first time! Alexander Utkin's Gamayun Tales are fresh and modern adaptations of familiar Russian folktales, teamed with...

Russia | Russian author-illustrator

Divine child
Gromac?a, Tatjana
Paper Book
In the early 1990s, as Yugoslavia begins to crumble, so too does a woman, known only as Mother. Ostracized by her Croatian neighbors because of her Serbian background, the bright cheer Mother brought to her role as a wife and mother is darkened by the onset of mental illness that devours an entire...

Serbia | Serbian author

The librarian of Auschwitz
Iturbe, Antonio
Paper Book
Based on the experience of real-life Auschwitz prisoner Dita Kraus, this is the incredible story of a girl who risked her life to keep the magic of books alive during the Holocaust. Fourteen-year-old Dita is one of the many imprisoned by the Nazis at Auschwitz. Taken, along...

Spain/Germany | Spanish author

Marina
Ruiz Zafo?n, Carlos
Paper Book
Carlos Ruiz Zafon's haunting gothic mystery, which has long been a cult classic in Spain and is now an international bestseller.   "We all have a secret buried under lock and key in the attic of our soul. This is mine."   ...

Spain | Spanish author

Wonderful feels like this
Lo?vestam, Sara
Paper Book
Sara Lovestam's Wonderful Feels Like Thisis "a coming-of-age tale of a young artist and is as soulful as it is triumphant" (SLJ) that celebrates being a little bit odd, finding your people, and the power of music to connect us For Steffi, going to school everyday...

Sweden | Swedish author

The end
Strandberg, Mats
Paper Book
When will the world end? With a massive comet, hurtling toward Earth, humanity now knows the exact date. 17-year-old Simon wants to spend his last weeks with the people he cares about most, especially his ex-girlfriend, Tilda. Since Lucinda was diagnosed with cancer, she's retreated into herself....

Sweden | Swdish author

Swimming in darkness
Harari, Lucas
Paper Book
Pierre is a young man at a crossroads. He drops out of architecture school and decides to travel to Vals in the Swiss Alps, home to a thermal springs complex located deep inside a mountain. The complex, designed by architect Peter Zumthor, had been the subject of Pierre's thesis. The mountain holds...

Switzerland | Swiss author

Heidi
Spyri, Johanna
Paper Book
The classic story of a little orphan girl in the Swiss Alps, with beautiful cover illustrations by Anna Bond, the artist behind world-renowned stationery brand Rifle Paper Co. At the age of five, little orphan Heidi is sent to live with her grandfather in the Alps. Everyone in...

Switzerland | Swiss author

Vita nostra
Di?a?chenko, Marina
Paper Book
"Vita Nostra" -- a cross between Lev Grossman's "The Magicians" and Elizabeth Kostova's "The Historian" [...] is the anti-Harry Potter you didn't know you wanted." -- The Washington Post "Vita Nostra has become a powerful influence on my own writing. It's a book that has the potential...

Ukraine | Ukrainian author

How war changed Rondo
Romanyshyn, Romana
Paper Book
A Kirkus Best Book of 2021: A Best Picture Book for Starting ConversationsA USBBY Outstanding International Book of 2022A Bank Street College of Education Best Book of 2022 War has come to the idyllic town of Rondo. Can...

Ukraine | Ukrainian author-illustrator

The orphanage : a novel
Z?H?adan, Serhii?
Paper Book
A devastating story of the struggle of civilians caught up in the conflict in eastern Ukraine   Chosen as one of "Six Books to Read for Context on Ukraine" by the New York Times   Selected by Publishers Weekly<...

Ukraine | Ukrainian author


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