What are good Adult Literature books featuring Teen Protagonists?

Question

My teacher is looking for a spring curriculum of good YA books that he can feature in an adult literature. He wants books that are interesting, good, and have "teenage protagonists." Thank you very much.

Answer 1

Windchill Summer by Norrish Mailer is an excellent book in which the three main protagonists are all young women right out of high school.

Answer 2

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime by Mark Haddon
- the protagonist is about 15/16 and is autistic. He lives in England.
The story starts out with the killing (gruesome) of a neighbor's dog. The hero is trying to solve the "murder" like his hero, Sherlock Holmes would have done.

The teacher may want to contact the Young Adult librarian at your local public library.He/she will have LOTS of good ideas for books and curriculum. They may be very happy to help you out!

Answer 3

a woman after my very own coronary heart. She could like the unique Grimms Fairie memories - they're fairly dark and lots greater twisted than the stupid variations Disney places out. If that's too youthful for her, according to probability attempt some Neil Gaiman. He wrote Coraline, yet much greater advantageous than it fairly is Neverwhere. that's like an Alice in Wonderland, yet interior the London Underground. If she likes Tim Burton, you may %. up his e book 'melancholy dying of Oyster Boy,' that's crammed with tragic characters (they're informed in poem style, yet truthfully dark comedy). Has she examine starvation video games yet? It occurs interior the destiny the place 24 toddlers (between a protracted time of 12 and 19 i think of) could combat to the dying on national television - and basically you are able to truly win. that's the only sequence i might say is as addicting as Harry Potter and that's have been given a great, stable woman significant character. some violence, for sure, notwithstanding it extremely is a great action e book for her age (and not over the right gory or something) besides, wish that supplies you some concepts!

Answer 4

I'm not sure I understand your question either. But either way I interpret it it's a good question. So I will answer it two ways:

1) What are some good adult novels featuring teenaged protagonists? Such books generally fall into the category of bildungsroman, which trace the growth of the main character from childhood to maturity. Some of these go beyond the teenage years, but they also give serious consideration to the character's youth and upbringing. Dickens' Great Expectations and David Copperfield and Twain's Huckleberry Finn are the classic examples; Catcher in the Rye is the prime 20th century example as well as Lord of the Flies and A Separate Peace. There are many lists of such books available. You might simply start with Wikipedia which has a list of 40 other examples written after 1930. Some of my favorites are Saul Bellow's Adventures of Augie March, Carson McCullers' Heart Is a Lonely Hunter, Pat Conroy's Lords of Discipline and The Great Santini, Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man (the first third of that book), even Sylvia Plath's Bell Jar. And there are many, many more.

(2) What are some "young adult" novels that are good reading also for adults? The old "junior novel" or "adolescent novel" was seen as a branch of chiildren's literature. These novels tended to be teenage love stories (too prissy), sports stories, car stories (e.g., Henry Gregor Felsen's Hot Rod), vocational stories (like the Sue Barton nurse stories, and the old-fashioned Horatio Alger), kids' science fiction (Robert Heinlein's Farmer in the Sky and Podkayne of Mars), and the like.

But in 1967 with the publication of The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton, the "adolescent novel" began to take on more serious subjects and to treat them with at a deeper level. Suddenly they were not quite so rigidly censored; real language, real teenage sexual mores, real family issues, teen violence and drugs began to creep in. These were written for, about, and from the point of view of teenagers--not older children.

Then, around the early 1970s, a man named Robert Cormier wrote a novel; he was not thinking of it as a teenage novel but it was about teenage boys in a private school--boys who bullied and cheated each other and manipulated the system (as they were also manipulated by the system). The publishers thought it might have a better market as a "young adult" novel. Cormier consented. It was published as The Chocolate War, and a distinguished "young adult" novelist was discovered. I Am the Cheese and After the First Death were books of his that, if anything, were even more provocative and challenging that Chocolate War.

From that point on genuine "young adult" novels are, for all practical purposes, adult novels. Generally speaking, they are distinguished from adult novels ONLY because (1) they tend to be shorter, about 150 pages, and (2) they focus almost exclusively on teenage characters. Besides Hinton and Cormier, other good authors of "young adult" fiction include Paul Zindel (The Pigman), Walter Dean Meyers (stories about African American youngsters), Chris Crutcher (Running Loose, Athletic Shorts, Stotan), Ursula LeGuin (the Earthsea series), Francesca Lia Block (the Weetzie Bat stories), and many, many more--some less popular but stylistically more distinctive. Most of these are enjoyable adult reading. Occasionally one is worthy of adult study and analysis. The American Library Association publishes an annual list of Best Books for Young Adults, which includes both "young adult" books and adult books that appeal to teenagers. The books listed by laney_po above are, indeed, good examples of "young adult" novels with adult appeal.

I think putting both types of books together, the contemporary bildungsroman and the "young adult" novel, would make an excellent grouping; then putting teenagers and adults in book groups to talk about them with each other would be interesting, interesting, interesting.

Answer 5

Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
PUSH:a Novel by Sapphire
Coldest Winter Ever by Sister Souljah

Answer 6

A Separate Peace by John Knowles

Answer 7

I'm not sure I quite understand your question. Are you looking for Young Adult books featuring teen protagonists that are well written and may be of interest to adult readers? (Looking for Alaska comes to mind as a great example). Or are you looking for books published for the 'adult' audience that feature teen protagonists that might be of interest to young adults? The American Library Association publishes list of adult titles they feel would have teen appeal--I can think of Ender's Game and Ender's Shadow as two examples of adult books for teens.

YA books adults should definitely consider reading :)
Looking for Alaska by John Green
Here There Be Dragons by James A. Owen
Twilight by Stephenie Meyer
The Boy In The Striped Pajamas by John Boyne

Answer 8

What about Great Expectations? Pip is a boy and a very young man for much of the novel. Only at the end do you see him all growed up.

Answer 9

Catcher in the rye by JD Salinger comes to mind

Answer 10

The best book I know of is Huckleberry Finn.