Books for teens and young adults on the consequences of bullying and how it can affect mental health.
Silence is Goldfish
Annabel Pitcher
Tess Turner has never really felt she fitted in and after what she read that night on her father’s blog she knows for certain that she never will. How she deals with her discovery makes an entirely riveting, heart-breaking story told through Tess’s eyes as she tries to find her place in the world.
Hazel Hill is Gonna Win This One
Maggie Horne and Luna Valentine
Girls in Hazel’s school are being harassed by an anonymous person online, someone who seems to know all about their insecurities and dreams. With no one willing to stand up and face the bully, how will Hazel be able to prove her suspicions?
And the Stars Were Burning Brightly
Danielle Jawando
When 15-year-old Nathan discovers that his older brother Al, has taken his own life, his whole world is torn apart. Al was special. Al was talented. Al was full of passion and light – so why did he do it? Convinced that his brother was in trouble, Nathan decides to retrace Al’s footsteps. As he does, he meets Megan, Al’s former classmate, who is as determined as Nathan to keep Al’s memory alive. Together they start seeking answers, but will either of them be able to handle the truth about Al’s death when they eventually discover what happened?
We Are All Made of Molecules
Susin Nielsen
Stewart’s geeky, gifted, and sees things a bit differently to most people. His mum has died and he misses her all the more now he and Dad have moved in with Ashley and her mum. Ashley’s popular, cool, and sees things very differently to her new family. Her dad has come out and moved out – but not far enough. And now she has to live with a freakazoid step-brother. Stewart can’t quite fit in at his new school, and Ashley can’t quite get used to her totally awkward home, which is now filled with some rather questionable decor.
Thornhill
Pam Smy
This is a dark tale, highly illustrated and an affecting portrayal of bullying and its consequences.
As she unpacks in her new bedroom, Ella is irresistibly drawn to the big old house that she can see out of her window. Surrounded by overgrown gardens, barbed wire fences and ‘keep out’ signs. It looks derelict. But that night a light goes on in one of the windows. And the next day she sees a girl in the grounds. Ella is hooked, the house has a story to tell, she is sure of it. Enter Thornhill, Institute for Children, and discover the dark secrets that lie within. But once inside, will you ever leave?
Open Your Heart: Learn to Love Your Life and Love Yourself
Gemma Cairney and Aurelia Lange
Full of honest and practical advice from The Surgery agony aunt Gemma Cairney and a whole host of trained professionals and real people, ‘Open Your Heart’ is a best friend in a book. From heartbreak and heartache to body image and everything in between, it will help you learn to love your body, your friends and your family, and tell you what to do if things go wrong.
Wonder
R. J. Palacio
Auggie wants to be an ordinary 10-year-old. He does ordinary things – eating ice cream, playing on his Xbox. He feels ordinary – inside. But ordinary kids don’t make other ordinary kids run away screaming in playgrounds. Ordinary kids aren’t stared at wherever they go. Born with a terrible facial abnormality, Auggie has been home-schooled by his parents his whole life. Now, for the first time, he’s being sent to a real school. All he wants is to be accepted. But can he convince his new classmates that he’s just like them, underneath it all?
Black Brother, Black Brother
Jewell Parker Rhodes
Donte wishes he were invisible. As one of the few black boys at Middlefield Prep, he feels as if he is constantly swimming in whiteness. Most of the students don’t look like him. They don’t like him either. Dubbed the ‘Black Brother’, Donte’s teachers and classmates make it clear they wish he were more like his lighter skinned brother, Dre.
Quiet, obedient. When an incident with ‘King’ Alan leads to Donte’s arrest and suspension, he knows the only way to get even is to beat the king of the school at his own game: fencing. With the help of a former Olympic fencer, Donte embarks on a journey to carve out a spot on Middlefield Prep’s fencing team and maybe learn something about himself along the way.
The Weight of Water
Sarah Crossan
Armed with a suitcase and an old laundry bag filled with clothes, Kasienka and her mother leave Poland and head for the UK to find her father. Life is lonely for Kasienka. At home her mother’s heart is breaking and at school Kasienka finds it impossible to make new friends.
The Chocolate War
Robert Cormier
The headmaster of Trinity College asks Archie Costello, the leader of the Vigils, a secret society that rules the school, to help with the selling of 20,000 boxes of chocolates in the annual fund-raising effort. Archie sees the chance of adding to his power – he is the Assigner, handing out to the boys tasks to be performed if they are to survive in the school. Freshman, Jerry Renault, a newcomer to the corrupt regime, refuses to sell chocolates. Enormous mental and physical pressure is put on him but he will not give in – the result is an inevitable, explosive tragedy.
Face
Benjamin Zephaniah
In his debut novel, poet Benjamin Zephaniah tackles the moving story of a young man, Martin, whose life is completely changed when his face is badly scarred in a joyriding accident.
Lord of the Flies
William Golding
A plane crashes on a desert island and the only survivors, a group of schoolboys, assemble on the beach and wait to be rescued. By day they inhabit a land of bright fantastic birds and dark blue seas, but at night their dreams are haunted by the image of a terrifying beast.
Blood Moon
Lucy Cuthew
During astronomy-lover Frankie’s first sexual experience with the quiet and lovely Benjamin, she gets her period. It’s only blood, they agree. But soon a graphic meme goes viral, turning their fun, intimate afternoon into something disgusting, mortifying and damaging. As the online shaming takes on a horrifying life of its own, Frankie begins to wonder: is her real life over?
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