100 Books for Teens and Tweens

Cage of Bone by Leanne Beattie

Ronnie Campbell thinks she’s handling her sister Katherine’s suicide just fine. Grade 10 has started and while there are lots of whispered rumors in the hall, Ronnie tries to ignore them. But it’s hard living in the shadow of a dead girl, especially one who had it all: popularity, good looks and a promising future. Even though she tries to hide it, Ronnie is lost and struggles to find out why her seemingly perfect sister would take such a drastic step. As she searches for answers, Ronnie continues to see and speak to Katherine as if she were still alive. But no amount of imaginary conversations can tell Ronnie what pushed her sister to the edge. All she has is a strip of photo booth images of Katherine with an unknown boy””the person who might just hold the key to everything.

The Guy, the Girl, the Artist and His Ex by Gabrielle Williams

Four lives collide when one of the world’s most famous paintings is stolen. It’s a mystery that has the nation talking, but while Picasso’s Weeping Woman might be absent from the walls of the National Gallery, in other parts of Melbourne the controversial painting’s presence is being felt by Guy, Rafi, Luke and Penny for four very different reasons. Life, love, art and one giant party intersect in this offbeat comedy about good intentions, unexpected consequences and the irresistible force of true love.

Puberty Blues by Kathy Lette and Gabrielle Carey

Written twenty years ago, Puberty Blues is the best-selling account of growing up in the 1970s that took Australia by storm and spawned an eponymous cult movie. It also marked the starting point of Kathy Lette’s writing career, which sees her now as an author at the forefront of her field. Puberty Blues is about top chicks and surfie spunks and the kids who don’t quite make the cut: it recreates with fascinating honesty a world where only the gang and the surf count. It’s a hilarious and horrifying account of the way many teenagers live and some of them die. Kathy Lette and Gabrielle Carey’s insightful novel is as painfully true today as it ever was.

Every Breath by Ellie Marney

Rachel Watts is an unwilling new arrival to Melbourne from the country. James Mycroft is her neighbour, an intriguingly troubled seventeen-year-old genius with a passion for forensics. Despite her misgivings, Rachel finds herself unable to resist Mycroft when he wants her help investigating a murder. And when Watts and Mycroft follow a trail to the cold-blooded killer, they find themselves in the lion’s den – literally. A night at the zoo will never have quite the same meaning again.

Obernewtyn by Isobelle Carmody

For Elspeth Gordie freedom is-like so much else after the Great White-a memory. It was a time known as the Age of Chaos. In a final explosive flash everything was destroyed. The few who survived banded together and formed a Council for protection. But people like Elspeth-mysteriously born with powerful mental abilities-are feared by the Council and hunted down like animals…to be destroyed. Her only hope for survival to is keep her power hidden. But is secrecy enough against the terrible power of the Council?

Between the Lives by Jessica Shirvington

For as long as she can remember, Sabine has lived two lives. Every 24 hours she Shifts to her “²other”² life – a life where she is exactly the same, but absolutely everything else is different: different family, different friends, different social expectations. In one life she has a sister, in the other she does not. In one life she”²s a straight-A student with the perfect boyfriend, in the other she”²s considered a reckless delinquent. Nothing about her situation has ever changed, until the day when she discovers a glitch: the arm she breaks in one life is perfectly fine in the other. With this new knowledge, Sabine begins a series of increasingly risky experiments which bring her dangerously close to the life she”²s always wanted… But just what – and who – is she really risking?

Stolen by Lucy Christopher

Sixteen year old Gemma is kidnapped from Bangkok airport and taken to the Australian Outback. This wild and desolate landscape becomes almost a character in the book, so vividly is it described. Ty, her captor, is no stereotype. He is young, fit and completely gorgeous. This new life in the wilderness has been years in the planning. He loves only her, wants only her. Under the hot glare of the Australian sun, cut off from the world outside, can the force of his love make Gemma love him back? The story takes the form of a letter, written by Gemma to Ty, reflecting on those strange and disturbing months in the outback. Months when the lines between love and obsession, and love and dependency, blur until they don’t exist – almost.

Fury by Shirley Marr

Let me tell you my story. Not just the facts I know you want to hear. If I’m going to tell you my story, I’m telling it my way. Strap  yourself in… Eliza Boans has everything. A big house. A great education. A bright future. So why is she sitting in a police station confessing to murder?

Rhyming Boy by Steven Herrick

Jayden Hayden, wordsmith, a.k.a rhyming boy, doesn’t have a dad – just a mum obsessed with Jayden Finch, the footballer, and an embarrassing name that gets him teased. When a school father-son day is announced, Jayden’s quest for answers becomes a puzzle he needs to solve, and quickly. Could Jayden Finch be more than just a footballer? With the help of his an-answer-to-every-question friend Saskia, he aims to track down his namesake and his father all in one go.

Zac and Mia by A.J. Betts

So says seventeen-year-old Zac Meier during a long, gruelling leukaemia treatment in Perth, Australia. A loud blast of Lady Gaga alerts him to the presence of Mia, the angry, not-at-all-stoic cancer patient in the room next door. Once released, the two near-strangers can’t forget each other, even as they desperately try to resume normal lives. The story of their mysterious connection drives this unflinchingly tough, tender novel told in two voices.