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 Libraries Youth team at Wellington City Libraries
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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

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, presented here in a fine hardcover edition. The Diary of a Young Girl is the record of two years in the life of a remarkable...

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

Street without a name : childhood and other misadventures in Bulgaria
Kassabova, Kapka
Paper Book
Kassabova was born in Sofia, Bulgaria and grew up under the drab, muddy, grey mantle of one of communism's most mindlessly authoritarian regimes. Escaping with her family as soon as possible after the collapse of the Berlin Wall, she lived in Britain, New Zealand, and Argentina, and several other...

Bulgaria | Bulgarian 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 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 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

The solitude of prime numbers
Giordano, Paolo
Paper Book
A bestselling international literary sensation about whether a "prime number" can ever truly connect with someone else A prime number can only be divided by itself or by one--it never truly fits with another. Alice and Mattia, both "primes," are misfits who seem destined to be...

Italy | Italian author

Between shades of gray
Sepetys, Ruta.
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * From the award-winning author of Salt to the Sea comes a "superb" (The Wall Street Journal), "eye-opening" (Los Angeles Times) novel of survival and hope in the darkest of places--the inspiration for the major motion picture Ashes in the...

Lithuania | Lithuanian-American author

Sophie's world : a novel about the history of philosophy
Gaarder, Jostein
Paper Book
A page-turning novel that is also an exploration of the great philosophical concepts of Western thought, Jostein Gaarder's Sophie's World has fired the imagination of readers all over the world, with more than twenty million copies in print. One day fourteen-year-old...

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

Anya's ghost
Brosgol, Vera.
Paper Book
Already love Vera's work? Don't miss her first novel Return to Sender! 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...

Russia | Russian-American author-illustrator

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

Heidi
Church, Lisa R.
Paper Book
What happens when a little orphan girl is forced to live with her cold and frightening grandfather? The heartwarming answer has engaged children for more than a century, both on the page and on the screen. Johanna Spyri's beloved story offers youngsters an endearing and...

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


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