Curated category · 2006—2025

Best young readers

Award-winning and editorially recommended young readers across twenty years, organized for discovery rather than sales ranking.

Selections: 703
Authors: 624
Lists & prizes: 3

Showing 49–96 of 703

2024Young readers

Dear Dad: Growing Up with a Parent in Prison – and How We Stayed Connected

Jay Jay Patton and Antoine Patton, with Kiara Valdez, illustrated by Markia Jenai

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Deer Run Home

Ann Clare LeZotte

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Dragonfruit

Makiia Lucier

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Drawn Onward

Daniel Nayeri, illustrated by Matt Rockefeller

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Everything We Never Had

Randy Ribay

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Faker

Gordon Korman

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Fledgling: The Keeper's Records of Revolution

S.K. Ali

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Flying Through Water

Mamle Wolo

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Heatwave

Lauren Redniss

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Heir

Sabaa Tahir

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

How It All Ends

Emma Hunsinger

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

I'm Sorry You Got Mad

Kyle Lukoff, illustrated by Julie Kwon

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Just Say Yes

Goldy Moldavsky

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

K Is in Trouble

Gary Clement

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Kareem Between

Shifa Saltagi Safadi

National Book Award for Young People's Literature

2024Young readers

Leo's First Vote!

Christina Soontornvat, illustrated by Isabel Roxas

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Lunar Boy

Jes and Cin Wibowo

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Lunar New Year Love Story

Gene Luen Yang, illustrated by LeUyen Pham

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Magnolia Wu Unfolds It All

Chanel Miller

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Mid-Air

Alicia D. Williams, illustrated by Danica Novgorodoff

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Most Ardently: A Pride & Prejudice Remix

Gabe Cole Novoa

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

My Antarctica: True Adventures in the Land of Mummified Seals, Space Robots, and So Much More

G. Neri, illlustrated by Corban Wilkin

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

My Thoughts Have Wings

Maggie Smith, illustrated by Leanne Hatch

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Not Quite a Ghost

Anne Ursu

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Olivetti

Allie Millington

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Pick the Lock

A.S. King

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Plain Jane and the Mermaid

Vera Brosgol

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Sheine Lende: A Prequel to Elatsoe

Darcie Little Badger, illustrated by Rovina Cai

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

The Bad Ones

Melissa Albert

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

The Book That Almost Rhymed

Omar Abed, illustrated by Hatem Aly

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

The Dictionary Story

Oliver Jeffers and Sam Winston

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

The Enigma Girls: How Ten Teenagers Broke Ciphers, Kept Secrets, and Helped Win World War II

Candace Fleming

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

The Eyes and the Impossible

Dave Eggers

John Newbery Medal

2024Young readers

The Greatest

Veera Hiranandani, illustrated by Vesper Stamper

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

The Judgment of Yoyo Gold

Isaac Blum

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

The Millicent Quibb School of Etiquette for Young Ladies of Mad Science

Kate McKinnon

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

The Wonderful Wisdom of Ants

Philip Bunting

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

The Yellow Bus

Loren Long

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Touch the Sky

Stephanie V.W. Lucianovic, illustrated by Chris Park

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Twenty-Four Seconds from Now ...

Jason Reynolds

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

Uprooted: A Memoir About What Happens When Your Family Moves Back

Ruth Chan

NPR Books We Love

2024Young readers

What Can a Mess Make?

Bee Johnson

NPR Books We Love

2023Young readers

A First Time for Everything

Dan Santat

National Book Award for Young People's Literature

2023Young readers

A Study in Drowning

Ava Reid

NPR Books We Love

2023Young readers

A Walk in the Woods

Nikki Grimes, illustrated by Jerry Pinkney and Brian Pinkney

NPR Books We Love

2023Young readers

Alone: The Journeys of Three Young Refugees

Paul Tom, illustrated by Mélanie Baillairgé, translated by Arielle Aaronson

NPR Books We Love

2023Young readers

An American Story

Kwame Alexander, illustrated by Dare Coulter

NPR Books We Love

2023Young readers

Bea Wolf

Zach Weinersmith, illustrated by Boulet

NPR Books We Love