I have run out of new books to read and I don't know of any good books. Does anyone know of any good books for a girl between 15 and 17? I like books that are serious and intriguing. I especially like fiction. I just read "Uglies", "Pretties" and "Specials" by Scott Westerfeild and "Such a Pretty Girl" by Laura Weiss and I loved them. Please don't say anything like Nancy Drew books or Gossip Girls. Nothing sleazy or trashy please. Also no Bible books please. You can recommend more than one book. Please tell me a little about the book without ruining it.
2007-02-08 09:06:07 · 20 answers · asked by megastarr92 2 in Arts & Humanities ➔ Books & Authors
May I suggest the works of Robert Heinlein? He writes Science Fiction, but his heriones are always strong, smart positive characters who are very, very female.
The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress - Great book about a revolution on the moon, deals with a lot of issues of how to govern, what a government's role is, and how to run a successful revolt. :-)
Friday (might be a bit risque' for this age group) - Friday is a Courier and she's also genetically enhanced. Brilliant, strong, fast, and very female. Deals with her search for her identity.
Stranger In A Strange Land - A baby is lost on Mars, raised by Martians and returns to Earth (where the story begins) - A classic from the 60's that covers everything from politics to religion. The women in it are all incredibly strong, talented and brilliant.
You may also enjoy The Way of the Peaceful Warrior - a philsophy book about a young male gymnast's search for meaning in his life.
Or...The Tao of Pooh - This book explains Taoism in a fun, easy to read fashion by using Winnie the Pooh characters! It's one of my favorites.
ANY of the Harry Potter books are great. I also still love to read any of the Chronicles of Narnia series (starting with The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe)
You may also like, if you're into Fantasy, the early Thieves World books. Little Fuzzy is a classic science fiction book about a small, golden-furred people and the definition of what it means to be sentient. Small, fast, easy to read, and fun.
Perhaps, for fantasy, the Belgaraiad by the Eddings. The first book is Pawn of Prophecy and is one of the most enjoyable fantasy series I've ever read. It's about a young boy facing his destiny of correcting an error in the way the universe is going...
Hope these help! Links to Amazon.com for these books, below...
2007-02-08 09:19:01 · answer #1 · answered by Orion 5 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Well, Scott WEsterfeld has written a LOT of books. Read them all, and join us crazy fans! I don't think that he's written anything that isn't amazing.
On the books like Uglies topic, the other related "cult classics" (as in, books that everyone seems to love- that's my definition, anyway) seem to be Twilight by Stephenie Meyer (a vampire romance), A Great and Terrible Beauty by Libba Bray (a book about a girls school in Victorian England where the girls create an order that leads them to other realms), Elsewhere by Gabrielle Zevin (not great, but about a dead girl's experience being dead), Tithe by Holly Black (a modern faerie tale), stuff by Neil Gaiman, who writes all kinds of stuff...Lots and lots of books. I believe that on Amazon you can browse related books to ones that you like, so mayhaps you should try that?
EDIT: Oh, more ideas! I'd agree with a fellow poster on Can't Get There From Here by Todd Strasser (homeless kids and their lives), then also add I AM THe Messenger by Marcus Zusack, which was also wuite beautiful. And there's always 1984 and A Brave New World, both dystopias, and books about the Holocaust are usually all "serious and intriguing". Happy reading!
2007-02-09 07:15:07 · answer #2 · answered by treehuggingveganhippy 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Considering your age, "The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants" series is probably below your reading level. So, I would reccomend
Wuthering Heights--Bronte
War and Peace--Tolstoy, the archetypal soap opera story
Anna Karenina--Tolstoy
The Catcher in the Rye-- Salinger, boy escapes from prep school, spends a few days alone in new york
The Grapes of Wrath-- Steinbeck, An extremely good portrayal of the Great Depression Period
Of Mice and Men-- Steinbeck, also about the depression
1984-- Orwell, about a negative utopia
The Stand--King, book about the end of the world
The Count of Monte Cristo-- Dumas, a prison break
Les Miserables-- Hugo, Napoleanic war novel
Atlas Shrugged--Rand, a philosophic book, about objectionalism
Tale of Two cities-- Dickens, the french revolution
Great Expectations-- Dickens, life of a young boy
David Copperfield-- Dickens, life of a young boy
The Silence of the Lambs-- Harris, Hannibal Lecter
2007-02-09 11:24:00 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
The Giver and its sequels Gathering Blue and Messenger by Lois Lowry are great books. They--like the Uglies trilogy--are dystopian.
You might also enjoy Margaret Peterson Haddix. In particular Turnabout, Running Out of Time, and Escape From Memory.
Double Helix by Nancy Werlin is a great read.
Life As We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer is also great.
Book Thief by Markus Zusak is "serious and intriguing"
2007-02-09 04:13:32 · answer #4 · answered by laney_po 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋
The Clique sequence- Lisi Harrison The Ashley's- Melissa de l. a. Cruz The expertise sequence- Zoey Dean candy Valley intense- Francine Pascal Alice sequence- Phyllis Reynolds Naylor Nancy Drew- Carolyn Keene infant-sitters club- Ann M. Martin
2016-11-02 22:17:21 · answer #5 · answered by ? 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Girl of the Limberlost
The Acorn People
A Gown of Spanish Lace
Izzy, Willy, Nilly
Fifteen
Going on Sixteen
The Blue Bottle Club
The Day of the Storm
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
Christy
Six Months to Live
The Locket and it's sequel the Carousel
A Room of my Own
Anne of Green Gables
The Unexpected Mrs. Polifax
Rebecca
Where the Red Fern Grows
Dreaming wAter
2007-02-08 10:54:36 · answer #6 · answered by Puff 5 · 0⤊ 1⤋
As a teenage girl myself, I have many suggestions...
Green Mansions by W.H. Hudson- a tremendos book, tropical romance, beautiful language, setting in the jungles of the AMazon
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte - fantastic, lovely plot
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte - anything by any of the Bronte sisters is fantastic, I guarantee it
The Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy - absolutely wonderful, Hardy is such a good judge of human character, the characters in his book are wonderful, book about fate, motives, love, basically just human nature in general. wonderful
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen - have you seen the movie? i really liked the movie, so much like the book, which was so great
Give Us Our Dream by Arthemise Goetz - less well known i think, a book from the '40s, an old lady who lives in an apartment, has amnesia, about the lives of everyone around her and how she affects them
My absolute favorite author is L.M. Montgomery. You may have read Anne of Green Gables, which is one of a series of 7 or 8. My favorite of hers is the Emily trilogy, starting with Emily of New Moon. I also really love her shorter novel The Blue Castle. So good. Everything of hers.
The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas- what a plot!!!! what characters!!! It's a little more difficult to read, I read the abridged version and it was so wonderful
That's all I'll list here
just kidding
I just remembered another
The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd - WONDERFUL read it as soon as you can
2007-02-08 09:48:28 · answer #7 · answered by tlex 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
I'd recomend Twilight and New Moon by Stephenie Meyer-they're both really good romances (without anything hotter than kissing in them. I've yet to hear of a girl who didn't like them). Also, since you said you liked Scott Westerfield, have you tried his Midnighters series? It's pretty good. I'd also recomend Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, and this book called Bass Ackwards and Belly Up, which is really good-sort of like an older version of Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants. Tamora Pierce is also a good writer-any books by her are worth reading, and she has so many I'm not even going to list them. She writes about heroines in this made up universe called Tortall, which are a favorite among most of her readers. (she has another set of books that are set in another universe which I don't remember the name of). They're sort of fantasy-ish though, so if you're not into that, they might not be the books for you.
Diane Duane is also a good writer-for a 15-17 year old, I'd recomend her Young Wizards books, which are just very intriging and are pretty much "smart kid books" which to me means that not all readers will be able to enjoy the books because they're just not interested in them. For example, in chemistry, we just learned about something I'd heard about in the books, and I got to look like a geek because I knew what we were talking about. Anyway, that's just my geekish tendancies speaking out.
Jaclyn Moriarty is also a good author-two of her books, Feeling Sorry for Celia and The Year of Secret Assignments are some of my favorites, and are about girls at this school in Australia. However, neither book is specifically about the same girls-their lives may meet at one point, but they're not about the same character. Meg Cabot is also a good author-any of her books are enjoyable as well, either young adult or adult novels (but the adult novels do have some scenes that could be considered "trashy" I guess.)
Classic books like Wuthering Heights, Pride &Prejudice, and Sense & Sensability are also good reads; it never hurts to read older literature, just because it's classic. Also, it almost never has any sleazy scenes in it because it wasn't appropriate at the time to print that. Good luck finding books!
2007-02-08 09:39:50 · answer #8 · answered by Aurelia 4 · 2⤊ 0⤋
Inkheart
Inkspell
The Thief Lord
Dragon Rider --These are all Cornelia Funke's book
The Bartimaeus Trilogy by Jonathan Stroud
Ranger's Apprentice by John Flanagan
Septimus Heap Series by Angie Sage
Inheritance Trilogy (Eragon and Eldest) by Christopher Paolini
Lord of the Ring by J.R.R Tolkien
Harry Potter by J.K Rowling
2007-02-09 04:02:36 · answer #9 · answered by BookWorm 2 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Try "The Kite Runner" or "Catcher in the Rye". They are really excellent read, not just for leisure but it contains life lessons and is full of significant meanings & morals. Also try "Cinnamon Gardens" by Shyam Salvedurai... I liked that book because of the main female protagonist, Annalukshmi Kandia, and its about a coming of age novel, fantastic read.
2007-02-08 09:15:48 · answer #10 · answered by ♥Curious♥chick♥flick♥ 2 · 1⤊ 0⤋