Books for children with absent fathers

[Estraya]

I'm hoping you can help me. I'm looking for books for my 12 year old daughter that have characters who don't see their dads. She's feeling very alone as all her friends have a father figure in their lives in some way and she no longer does (because of his behaviour, not because of his death). There seem to be lots of books for younger children but I'm struggling to find anything for her age. Any recommendations?

Sorry to hear that.

What genres does she like?

Possibly not the character arc you wanted nor age but I think Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson had the protagonist abandoned as a child though (spoilers) his father was the god Poseidon who had a narratively good reason for abandoning him.

Good luck in finding some good stories.

Similarly Artemis Fowl spend part of the series looking for his father who also had a narratively sound reason for being absent.

The Ingo series by Helen Dunmore could be one.

It's a 4 book magic realism series with mermaids. Basically the protagonist's dad supposedly dies at the start of the first book but the protagonist and her brother never believe he is dead and eventually you find out that he isn't and has chosen to leave the family. He still has a reason for being absent, but ultimately he has chosen to leave his children quite selfishly, so if your Dad's dad is absent due to his own actions, this may be a bit more relatable for her than Percy Jackson (though I love PJ and you should definitely encourage her to read them too!)

The protagonist also goes through a lot of emotions that you DD may experience some day, such as learning to rely on her mother for things she had counted on dad for. Mum getting a new boyfriend and not wanting to accept him, other kids asking about where her Dad is, and adults talking about how not having a dad affects her as if it's the reason for every undesirable behaviour she has.

My Family and Other Animals
Cider with Rosie

She might feel a bit old for Swallows and Amazons, but both families have absentee fathers for different reasons.

I am aware that in all these books, the paternal absence helps to set up the plot but doesn't feature much after that, so they may not be what you're looking for.

Lots of Jacqueline Wilson books have absent fathers.

One that you may not have thought of:
Enid Blyton Adventure series. The Mannerings have just their Mum, the Trents are orphans.

Often the books from that era may have an absent father (often in the military like the Swallows and Amazons) but equally often there is a Father substitute. So In Swallows and Amazons there's Captain Flint, for example. Don't know whether that would make her feel worse.

The Ogre Downstairs is fun, although it's about a Stepfather (that the children hate most of the way through the book) rather than an absent Father.