It might be easy to pass YA novels off as romantic fluff filled with forbidden love and brooding characters. But the genre is way more than just that: Great YA books have the potential to reflect what pre-teens or teens are learning about and experiencing in their world right now, and to help them better understand complex topics and current events.
Many older kids today are talking about important issues like LGBTQ+ rights, racism, cultural identity, grief, and immigration with their classmates, teachers, and social media networks. These books touch on those topics and much more to lend young adults well-rounded perspectives, all while hooking them on reading with relatable characters and thought-provoking plots.
Get your tween or teen set up for the school year with these books that their peers love. Although they’re fiction, they reflect the very real world our kids live in and the issues they deal with — and that’s an invaluable characteristic of any book.
