1. The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
Told in the form of letters, Perks is a book that explores what it's like to not quite belong. This is a book that I recommend to everyone who asks me what to read, and it's a book I think everyone should read. It says so much about relationships, popularity, insecurities. Not only that, but as it unfold it reveals the ghosts that can cling to our bones without the world seeing them.
Charlie is a freshman starting high school with no friends, and he meets the most vibrant group of friends who lead him through his first year of high school. They all exist on the outskirts of society, finding solace in who they are. It's filled with sex, drugs, young love, loss, what it means to be a wallflower and (if you aren't already convinced) The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Chbosky truly captures what it means to not know where you fit, as most teenagers feel at one point or another. But what Perks also reveals is fitting in is not the place that gives you the most perspective, while also indicating how that perspective can act as a curse.
The Perks of Being a Wallflower is a book about what is means to be a teenager, what is means to be high school and not know who you are, but desperately clinging to find out who you define yourself to be rather than who other people define you to be. Not only did Perks teach me to accept myself for all the confusion I have about who I am, but also to know that part of being alive is not being okay all of the time. The Perks of Being a Wallflower is definitely not light and fluffy and that's what makes it important.
2. Looking For Alaska by John Green
Looking For Alaska was John Green's debut book, and of the ones that I have read, I argue it is the best. Not weighed down or coasting on internet hype, Looking For Alaska speaks for itself in the most beautiful way possible.
This is another book that follows an outcast. Miles "Pudge" Halter doesn't really have any friends, so he's moving to a new school, a boarding school. He has an obsession with famous last words, but this has only made him wish for "The Great Perhaps", the chance in life to take a chance. He moves school to Culver Creek Boarding School, and meets his roommate, The Colonel, and Alaska Young - a girl as mysterious as a hurricane.
Green splits this book into Before and After, and what follows the exciting adventurous Miles experiences Before, is the heartbreaking truth of After.
How do we cope when everything we hold as dear in the present, is taken away from us? How do you cope when nothing will ever be the same?
3. Harry Potter By J.K Rowling
Okay, so I know this is technically a series but I couldn't possibly just pick one. These books are the books of my childhood, they have grown with me and I constantly find new things within them that I fall in love with.
Everyone knows what Harry Potter is about. A young boy who finds out he's a wizard and goes to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. But it's so much more than that. It's about loyalty, friendship, family, love. Harry Potter is about what it means to be good and evil, and are bad people inherently bad. Questions of how we can define people; how our own choices shape who we are and who we want to be; the difference between blood and family; the importance of friendship; and the strength of happiness are explored.
There is so much more to these books than just children's books about magic. They are exciting and engaging for children, and they are mysterious, growing darker as the characters age, as life introduces us to darker themes as we age. They are valuable children's books because they don't shy away from the things that may scare children. But there is also so much value in them for adults, and that is why they have remained one of my favourite series.
4. Anything Shadowhunters by Cassandra Clare
As Harry Potter is my childhood series, Cassandra Clare was the author I fell in love with as I entered into Secondary School and became a young adult. At age 11, I started The Mortal Instruments and six years later I still look forward to each and every Cassandra Clare release. While we've had some questionable adaptations over the years, that does not take away from the fact that each Cassandra Clare release just gets better.
The Shadowhunter Chronicles follows a race of half angel, half human warriors who battle demons with the help of runes from which they draw their strength. Fierce protectors with a iron clad sense of justice - although the characters we follow do not always find their sense of justice aligned with the law, after all "A bad law, is no law." Cassandra Clare approaches topics surrounding sexuality, race, relationships, grief, loyalty and just about every way to bend the laws of the Shadow world under the sun. As well as having some of the most complex family trees.
Clare has not only built her own group of character, she's built her own universe. One where even if a previous character is not the focus of a new series, you can be pretty certain you'll see their face again. I fall in love with Cassandra Clare characters the way I fall in love with nobody else, because they are so well written intertwined with a world that in so complex and beautiful that they almost feel like they could be real people. The Shadowhunter Chronicles is a fantasy in a recognisable setting, where the characters battle demons one minute and battle making pancakes the next.
5. History Is All You Left Me by Adam Silvera
Anyone who has ever read an Adam Silvera book will know that they ruin you. I have never heard of a single person who can read an Adam Silvera book and not cry. That's for good reason.
History Is All You Left Me was the first Adam Silvera I read, and it is by no means the last. Not only is the LGBTQ+ representation in his books amazing, purely for the authenticity of not being focused purely on representation. History Is All You Left Me is the heartfelt and heartbreaking story of love and heartache among grief. We follow Griffin, whose ex-boyfriend Theo dies in an accident. Although Theo had moved away for college and started seeing Jackson, Griffin believed that they would be together in the end. Now his view of his future has change entirely, and to make it even worse, the only one who truly understands what Griffin is going through is Theo's new boyfriend, Jackson. When someone you should hate, or at the least be envious of, is the one who understands you the best, how can you not get to know them?
I guarantee that anyone who reads this will cry, but in this best way. Nobody that I have ever read from can portray the raw quality of pain quite like Adam Silvera.
6. The Poet X by Elizabeth Acevedo
This book is unique, not only for it's representation, or considering it's an own voices novel, but because it's written entirely in verse.
I love poetry. The narrative that Acevedo strings through each and every poem, as it's not a continuous piece of verse but individual poems that tell such a well formed story, is crafted with such intrinsic care. The Poet X is a book I read in one sitting, from one to four in the morning, which arguably isn't one of my better ideas but I couldn't put it down.
Xiomara Batista is trying to find a balance between feeling outspoken and suffocated by her Harlem neighbourhood, and her mother's emphasis on religion. She find solace in writing down her feelings in the form of poetry, and quickly becomes captivated by the idea of slam poetry. But when Xiomara is invited to her school's slam poetry club, she doesn't know how to balance her mother's insistence on her following the laws of the church, and her need to be heard - even if she isn't quite sure where her voice fits yet. This is a coming of age story, of how to balance your parents belief of who you should be, with the person that you wish to become. Acevedo emphasises that everyone has a voice, if they're willing to speak up and use it, but also indicates how difficult that can be.
The Poet X is a story of the heartache Xiomara experiences when the thing she loves, the thing which gives her a voice, contrasts with her mother's beliefs of what her daughter should do in order to make a future for herself in America, a place where her parents immigrated to in order to give their children a better chance. But is the view your parents hold of the pathway you should take, the only route to a successful future? What happens when the belief's you were raised on, are no longer the belief's that align with your heart?
7. Dear Martin by Nic Stone
I read Dear Martin in one sitting, on a flight in July 2018 to Paphos, Cyprus. I sat still for maybe three hours reading this book from cover to cover, not wishing to put it down. While The Hate U Give is amazing, Dear Martin added to the conversation of what it means to be young and black in America in the most amazing of ways. In the way that The Hate U Give was about Starr using her voice, Dear Martin is about Justyce trying to use his head when faced with a mentality that automatically puts him at a disadvantage.
Following Justyce McAllister, who is top of his class and has his sights set on the Ivy Leagues, Stone tackle the conversation about race relations in America. Justyce is stopped by police and put in handcuffs, resulting in his inability to not see the race problem around him, which is only amplified by the scorn of his former peers and ridicule of his classmate. He's proof that it doesn't matter how much he tries to fit in, people always see his skin colour fist. Justyce begins to write letters to Martin Luther King Jr, attempting to use the teachings of King in his own life. But Justyce's confusion is only amplified when Justyce and his friend Manny are caught in conflict with a white off-duty cop. Once shots are fired and fates are sealed, it's Justyce who is under attack. It's Justyce who must try and make the decision of what his life, and his friend's life, mean.
8. Clean by Juno Dawson
This is another book I read on my holiday to Paphos. Arguably not a summer holiday read, but I've always liked the grittier side of life so it's not so out of place.
Juno Dawson is a captivating writer. One who isn't afraid to show the underbelly of what would usually be considered the glamorous life of socialite, Lexi Volkov. When Lexi almost overdoses, her brother decides that enough is enough and forces her into rehab. She's hit rock bottom, and usually the only place to go from rock bottom is up. But people can only help you if you want to be helped. As Lexi begins to face her demons only more seem to haunt her, as recovery is either the heaven or hell waiting at the end of the tunnel for Lexi and her fellow inmates; which in reality it is that is waiting she isn't quite sure. But a lot more goes on in rehab than just simply recovering, and things only get more complicated when Lexi meets the mysterious Brady.
Clean doesn't hold anything back, it rolls with the punches and just as you're knocked down by a punch, it uppercuts you to the ribs. The tagline for this book is, "It's a dirty business getting clean." Contrary to the title, Clean is not a glossed over depiction of addiction, it complete with all the unexpected twists and turns of recovery. You never know what's going to happen next, but one thing is for sure: it's one hell of a ride.
9. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
Probably the first book that I ever read at school and fell completely in love with. Steinbeck builds such complex characters and relationships in a relatively short novel in a way that makes you care so deeply for them. As a class, this book made more than half of us cry come the end, and that speaks volumes.
Following Lennie and George in the era of The Great Depression, Of Mice and Men paints the picture of what friendship truly mean. Alongside this, it indicates the importance of The American Dream for workers at this time in America to keep them going, and ensure that they were willing to travel endlessly in order to try and find work. This is once again a book that touches on themes of friendships, but it also considers morality and what it means to do the right thing is a lose/lose situation.
10. The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue by Mackenzi Lee
Arguably one of the most lighthearted reads on this list, Gentleman's Guide is funny, engaging and thrilling while touching on deeper topics such as disability, sexuality, the lasting effect of abuse and disapproval at the hands of your family. I absolutely flew through this book, as well as it's sequel The Lady's Guide to Petticoats and Piracy. The writing style is engage, and the characters are fun loving, rebellious and the type of people I would love to be friends with.
To begin, we follow Henry "Monty" Montague, who has been bred to be a respectable English Gentleman, and is embarking on his Grand Tour of Europe, paid for by his father, with his best friend, Percy and little sister, Felicity who they are to drop off at boarding school along the way. However, the nature of The Grand Tour severely limits the freedom that Monty so desperately craves, with the wish for gambling, drinking, and flirting incessantly with Percy. But, soon Monty may get his wish for adventure. When a wrong move takes the three of them fleeing through Europe, a manhunt after them severely derailing the trip his father had arranged, everything Monty knows is thrown into question...Including his feelings for the boy he adores.
This is historical fiction, with a light heart, quick humour and romantic twist, filled to the brim with representation. Mackenzi Lee is the first person to ever make me believe I may enjoy historical fiction.
If you can't tell, reading is a large part of my life that means so much to me. Thank you for letting me spread my love with you.
Your stage is waiting.
Hollie x
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