Youthful Narrator

Level up with these stories told by children or younger-than-average people!

Updated April 16, 2025
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The adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Twain, Mark
Paper Book
Hilariously picaresque, epic in scope, alive withthe poetry and vigor of the American people, MarkTwain's story about a young boy and his journeydown the Mississippi was the first great novel tospeak in a truly American voice. Influencingsubsequent generations of writers -- from SherwoodAnderson to...
All the water in the world : a novel
Raney, Karen
Paper Book
A stunning debut novel about a teenage girl and her mother as they grapple with first love, family secrets, and tragedy. Maddy is sixteen. Smart, funny, and profound, she has loyal friends, a mother with whom she's unusually close, a father she's never met, devoted grandparents,...
The Arab of the future : a graphic memoir : a childhood in the Middle East (1978-1984)
Sattouf, Riad
Paper Book
The Arab of the Future, the #1 French best-seller, tells the unforgettable story of Riad Sattouf's childhood, spent in the shadows of 3 dictators--Muammar Gaddafi, Hafez al-Assad, and his father In striking, virtuoso graphic style that captures both the immediacy of...
Beautiful country : a memoir
Wang, Qian Julie
Paper Book
A NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER * The moving story of an undocumented child living in poverty in the richest country in the world--an incandescent debut from an astonishing new talent * A TODAY SHOW #READWITHJENNA PICK In Chinese, the word for America, Mei Guo, translates...
Black swan green : a novel
Mitchell, David
Paper Book
Thirteen chapters provide monthly snapshots of Jason Taylor's life in small-town England. Whether battling his stammer, navigating the social hierarchy of his schoolmates, or watching the slow disintegration of his parents' marriage, he relates his story in a voice that is achingly true to life.
The boy on the bridge
Carey, M. R.
Paper Book
One exceptional boy journeys into the ashes of society to find the cure for a devastating plague in this riveting post-apocalyptic standalone set in the same world as the USA Today-bestselling The Girl With All the Gifts. Once upon a time, in a land blighted by...
Close your eyes, hold hands a novel
Bohjalian, Chris
Paper Book
A heartbreaking, wildly inventive, and moving novel narrated by a teenage runaway, from the bestselling author of Midwives and The Sandcastle Girls. Close Your Eyes, Hold Hands is the story of Emily Shepard, a homeless teen living in an igloo made of ice...
Dear world : a Syrian girl's story of war and plea for peace
Al Abed, Bana
Paper Book
"A story of love and courage amid brutality and terror, this is the testimony of a child who has endured the unthinkable." --J.K. Rowling "I'm very afraid I will die tonight." --Bana Alabed, Twitter, October 2, 2016 "Stop killing us." --Bana Alabed, Twitter,...
Garbage bag girl
Edmunds, Celeste L.
Paper Book
Ghost wall
Moss, Sarah
Paper Book
A Southern Living Best New Book of Winter 2019; A Refinery29 Best Book of January 2019; A Most Anticipated Book of 2019 at The Week, Huffington Post, Nylon, and Lit Hub; An Indie Next Pick for January 2019 "Ghost Wall has...
A girl is a body of water
Makumbi, Jennifer Nansubuga
Paper Book
In her thirteenth year, Kirabo confronts a piercing question: who is my mother? Kirabo has been raised by women in the small Ugandan village of Nattetta--her grandmother, her best friend, and her many aunts--but the absence of her mother follows her like a shadow. Seeking answers from Nsuuta, the...
Grace : a novel
Lynch, Paul
Paper Book
From the Booker Prize-winning author of Prophet Song, a sweeping, Dickensian story of a young girl on a life-changing journey across nineteenth-century Ireland on the eve of the Great Famine. Early one October morning, Grace's mother snatches her from...
Last bus to wisdom
Doig, Ivan.
Paper Book
A New York Times BestsellerAn Amazon Best Book of August 2015In the immortal American tradition, an unlikely pair light out on the road together, meeting a classic Doigian ensemble of characters and having rollicking misadventures along the way. Charming, wise, and slyly funny, this is a last sweet...
Oliver Twist
Dickens, Charles
Paper Book
Oliver is an orphan living on the dangerous London streets with no one but himself to rely on. Fleeing from poverty and hardship, he falls in with a criminal street gang who will not let him go, however hard he tries to escape. One of the most swiftly moving and unified of Charles...
The reason I jump : the inner voice of a thirteen-year-old boy with autism
Higashida, Naoki
Paper Book
A story never before told and a memoir to help change our understanding of the world around us, 13-year-old Naoki Higashida's astonishing, empathetic book takes us into the mind of a boy with severe autism. With an introduction by David Mitchell, author of the global phenomenon, Cloud Atlas,...
Room : a novel
Donoghue, Emma.
Paper Book
The award-winning bestseller that became one of the most talked about and memorable novels of the decade, Room is "utterly gripping...a heart-stopping novel" (San Francisco Chronicle).   Held captive for years in a small shed, a woman and her...
Something rising (light and swift)
Kimmel, Haven
Paper Book
In her first two books, Haven Kimmel claimed her spot on the literary scene- surprising readers with her memoir, A Girl Named Zippy, and winning an outpouring of critical acclaim for her first novel, The Solace of Leaving Early. Now, in her second novel, she brings to the page a heroine's tireless...
Something wicked this way comes
Bradbury, Ray
Paper Book
The carnival rolls in sometime after midnight, ushering in Halloween a week early. The shrill siren song of a calliope beckons to all with a seductive promise of dreams and youth regained. In this season of dying, Cooger & Dark's Pandemonium Shadow Show has come to Green Town, Illinois, to...
Swamplandia!
Russell, Karen
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....
The sweetness at the bottom of the pie
Bradley, Alan
Paper Book
WINNER OF THE AGATHA * ARTHUR ELLIS * DILYS * DEBUT DAGGER AWARDS  "Wonderfully entertaining . . . sure to be one of the most loved mysteries of the year . . . [Flavia is] a delightful, intrepid, acid-tongued new heroine."--Chicago Sun-Times...
Sweetness in the Skin : A Novel
Robinson, Ishi.
Paper Book
A delicious debut novel about a young Jamaican girl who tries to bake her way to a better life in France. Pumkin Patterson lives in a tiny two-room house in Kingston, Jamaica, with her grandmother, who wants to improve the family's social standing; her Aunt Sophie, who wants to take Pumkin...
Tell the wolves I'm home : a novel
Brunt, Carol Rifka.
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * A heartfelt story of love, grief, and renewal about two unlikely friends who discover that sometimes you don't know you've lost someone until you've found them "A dazzling debut novel."--O: The Oprah Magazine "Tremendously...
To kill a mockingbird
Lee, Harper
Paper Book
The unforgettable novel of a childhood in a sleepy Southern town and the crisis of conscience that rocked it, To Kill A Mockingbird became both an instant bestseller and a critical success when it was first published in 1960. It went on to win the Pulitzer Prize in 1961 and was later made...
When skateboards will be free : a memoir of a political childhood
Sayrafiezadeh, Saïd.
Paper Book
With a profound gift for capturing the absurd in life, and a deadpan wisdom that comes from surviving a surreal childhood in the Socialist Workers Party, Said Sayrafiezadeh has crafted an unsentimental, funny, heartbreaking memoir. Saïd¿s Iranian-born father and American Jewish mother had one thing...
A wizard's guide to defensive baking
Kingfisher, T.
Paper Book
Fourteen-year-old Mona isn't like the wizards charged with defending the city. She can't control lightning or speak to water. Her familiar is a sourdough starter and her magic only works on bread. She has a comfortable life in her aunt's bakery making gingerbread men dance.But Mona's life is turned...
Young Palestinians Speak : Living Under Occupation
Robinson, Anthony
Paper Book
In Palestine today, a second generation of children and young people is growing up experiencing life under occupation. These are children who know only fear when they see an Israeli soldier or come across a roadblock. This book provides a platform for young people, from all over this occupied land,...

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