Book recommendations for a keen 12-year-old wanting longer challenging reads

[GreenMarigold]

My daughter is turning 12 soon and I’d love some book recommendations for her.

She has been a keen reader for years and has loved the Warrior Cats, Lottie Brooks, Skulduggery Pleasant and Artemis Fowl books. She also enjoys poetry and classic literature like Poe and Shakespeare.

However it’s been a year or two since she has found a modern author to get stuck into. She likes a decent length book that’s a challenging read.

I want to get her some proper books rather than anime style books, as she loves those but finishes them in minutes!

In terms of genre she is quite open minded but has expressed an interest in some romantasy - but I would welcome any ideas at all!

Conan Doyle / Katherine Arundel / Diana Wynne Jones

Assistant to the Villain series - Hannah Nicole Maehrer
Divergent series - Veronica Roth
The Mortal Instruments series - Cassandra Clare

Lois Duncan - wrote some great kids supernatural thrillers in the 70s/80s which were great. Some are out of print. Daughters of Eve and Locked in Time were my favourite.

Roald Dahl short stories?

agree Michelle magician

Some things my 13 yo enjoyed a year or two ago:

Hunger Games and Twilight series. Kiran Milwood Hargrave. Raina Telgemeier. Neal Schusterman Scythe series. Holly Jackson. Lauren James. Patrick Ness. Pittacus Lore. Michael Scott Alchemist series.

Maybe take her to the library’s teen section and let her take her pick (with a quick sense check from you). Our library has teen and teen plus and the racier stuff is teen plus which helps me a lot!

Re all the “when I was 12 I loved” suggestions above. I read loads of those too and loved them. However I have tried and failed to get my voracious reader 13yo DD interested in any of them. (Ok she quite liked Hitchhiker’s Guide). I think writing styles have changed and a lot of the older books come across as old fashioned and use complex language which puts them off unfortunately. But you may have more luck.

Mine really enjoyed the Ya Ya sisterhood books at that age and still re reads them.

There are so many brilliant modern books for young people. Some of the above mentioned although good books might be quite hard going to today’s 12 year olds. I would take her to the young adult section of a good independent book shop and have a browse.

When We were Liars so good. And The Secret History.