Qur'an Shakir
It Runs in Our Blood
A vital, honest look at the friction between faith and modern identity that will resonate with any teen feeling caught in the middle of two worlds.
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The Thirty Names of Night
by Zeyn Joukhadar
Young adult · ages 14–18 · 920L · 2020
A lyrical, genuinely moving dual-narrative about a Syrian trans teen and his estranged father; literary and urgent without preaching, though it demands maturity and can feel heavy on first read.
Mansfield Revisited
by Joan Aiken
Young adult · ages 12–18 · 950L · 1985
A competent, respectful sequel that extends Austen's characters into adulthood; worth reading if your teen loves the original, but doesn't stand alone and lacks Austen's wit.
The Unraveling of Mercy Louis
by Keija Parssinen
Young adult · ages 14–18 · 820L · 2015
A searing, psychologically complex portrait of adolescent shame and identity suppression in a conservative context—genuinely literary for this age, but the sexual violence and unreliable narrator require maturity and parental awareness.