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What shall 14 year old DD read next? What grabbed you at that age ?

59 replies

Mollscroll · 08/11/2020 07:55

She’s a great reader. Or was till the phone took over. She’s just read Rebecca at my suggestion. She’s done a lot of Agatha Christie, Pride and Prejudice, and a lot of YA stuff. She’d
enjoy Jane Eyre but I think she needs something a bit easier first to reengage her.

I remember really enjoying A Town Like Alice at that age. Any other suggestions ?

OP posts:
Tarahumara · 08/11/2020 07:58

How about:
I Capture the Castle
The Pursuit of Love
To Kill a Mockingbird
Atonement
The Book Thief
The Kite Runner

Vanessashanessajenkins2 · 08/11/2020 08:00

At that age I really loved the His Dark Materials books.
I also loved history so read a lot of Phillipa Gregory.
Has she read Anne Frank's diary? I read it once every few years and come across something new each time.
My father is South Asian so I grew up reading Khaled Hosseini too - the Kite runner, a Thousand Splendid Suns. I did read them around that age and they were just so masterfully written and I learnt a lot about the culture and what sort of country my father grew up in.

lighteningmcqueens · 08/11/2020 08:01

Adrian mole?

yikesanotherbooboo · 08/11/2020 08:15

The day of the triffids
Cranford
All creatures great and small
Titus groan
Sherlock Holmes
All Jane Austen

Dickens eg David copper field
The Forsyte Saga
Barchester Towers
Lord Peter Wimsey
Early Jilly Coopers
Dick Francis type stories or eg Elly Griffiths
My DD liked shopoholic books at that age

Choccyp1g · 08/11/2020 08:41

Burning Bright by Helen Dunmore. Clever story, teenage protagonist, can't say more for fear of spoilers.
The Greatcoat is another good one of hers.

gingerbreadfox · 08/11/2020 09:05

At that age I love Michael Morpurgo, specifically Warhorse.

What about some of the newer YA books such as Hunger Games, Maze Runner, Twilight, Divergent ?

DesperatelySeekingSunshine · 08/11/2020 09:29

At that age we were all massively in to the Virginia Andrew’s, Flowers in the Attic series of books. This was back in the early 90s
But looking back they all had such big helpings of incest, I’m not entirely sure they were ever very appropriate! Confused

TheTurnOfTheScrew · 08/11/2020 09:32

If she liked Rebecca what about more Du Maurier? My 13yo really enjoyed My Cousin Rachel and Jamaica In. She also recently liked The Woman In Black, and We Have Always Lived In the Castle.

Scout2016 · 08/11/2020 13:23

Bilgewater by Jane Gardem
Bit of a grim story in some ways but Sal by Mick Kitson is great with teenage female central character with guts.
Would she like some of Roddy Doyle? Easy to read without being childish.
Secret life of Bees by Sue Monk Kid is an easy read with a young female central character too.

merryhouse · 08/11/2020 14:04

Oooh, I read both Burning Bright and Bilgewater - Bilgewater when I was 14.

Other books at that time:

Wizard of Earthsea trilogy by Ursula K LeGuin
Georgette Heyer - wrote both Austen-like and Christie-like so pretty much guaranteed to please!
SE Hinton - The Outsiders and "That was then, this is now"
Susan Cooper's Dark Is Rising sequence (5 books, starting with Over Sea Under Stone)
Alan Garner
Noel Streatfeild - Gemma and Sisters etc
lots of CS Lewis, but I was both religious and a weirdo. Till We Have Faces is interesting.
Asimov's short stories
Wodehouse

merryhouse · 08/11/2020 14:08

I also read all the Chalet School I could get my hands on, which probably wasn't particularly good for me.

I kept seeing Thomas Covenant in the library and thinking it looked great, but never actually got round to it. Read the first book as an adult and on balance I'm glad I didn't at 14 (a rape is central to the plot).

merryhouse · 08/11/2020 14:15

I read a few of the Alexander Kent maritime novels (Midshipman Bolitho etc) - don't see them around much nowadays, been superseded by Patrick O'Brian (Master and Commander et seq). I skim-read several sections of that, substituting the words "rope" and "sail" for quite a lot of things Grin

merryhouse · 08/11/2020 14:20

Oh, and Flashman (not sure how suitable that is but I don't think it did me any more harm than the rest of society)

MyCatReallyIsAGit · 08/11/2020 14:35

She might also like Helen Dunmore’s Zennor in Darkness.

I Capture the Castle would be a great read.

She might also like Lois Lowry, who I loved at that age.

Has she read To Kill A Mockingbird?

Monstamio · 08/11/2020 14:39

I loved all the Anne of Green Gables books at that age.

Twizbe · 08/11/2020 14:43

Northanger abbey - my favourite Austen

ScarletPimpernel97 · 08/11/2020 14:45

Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis de Bernieres.
It was the first book which really made me feel something.
The Bloody Chamber - Angela Carter. Quite dark but good.
Wuthering Heights.
Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China - Jung Chang.
Dracula
White Fang/The Call of the Wild - Jack London

GhostTypeEevee · 08/11/2020 14:45

Ds14 is reading Animal Farm and really enjoying it. He's planning on reading Noughts and Crosses next

Tartyflette · 08/11/2020 14:55

Another Daphne du Maurier -- Frenchman's Creek. More of a novella really but appealed greatly to my teenage fantasies!
Some of the books here, (like Anne of Green Gables) i read and enjoyed very much when i was 11 or 12 but wanted more adult books by 14.
I can endorse A Town Like Alice, it was great. I read other Neville Shute books too but that was the best.
For lighter reads, how about some Gerald Durrell, if she likes animals? Very funny and engaging.

LastGoldenDaysOfSummer · 08/11/2020 14:58

I got into science fiction and fantasy in my early teens. Never looked back.

CaurnieBred · 08/11/2020 14:59

I was never one for classics. At 14 I used to more or less live in the library and would read anything: from Barbara Cartland to Gerald Durrell: if the cover or synopsis looked good, I read it. We didn't have the Young Adult range back in the 80s: you went from children to adult.

I remember reading Jackie Collins, Barbara Taylor-Bradford, Jean Plaidy, James Herriot, Barbers Erskine, Lace (can't remember who wrote that!). I loved sagas, especially Cynthia Harrod-Eagles's Morland Dynasty (set in Yorkshire from 13C onwards I think: a great introduction to UK history and royal succession).

Ellmau · 08/11/2020 15:40

Mary Stewart?

17caterpillars1mouse · 08/11/2020 15:46

I remember loving a book series called the forbidden games which was in the point horror series. I also loved a series about faeries, the first was called tithe by Holly Black. I reread it as an adult

These are the books that stood out as I remember them well. Another was a true story called Sold about a girl sold off for marriage in the Yemen but tbh I think I was probably a bit young for it at 14. It really opened my eyes to the world though

DramaAlpaca · 08/11/2020 15:49

I read anything I could get my hands on at that age.

My favourite was the historical novel Katherine by Anya Seton. I adored it.

Blackcountryexile · 08/11/2020 16:03

The Museum of You by Carys Bray .Interesting for showing different perspectives on the same event.

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