Hi all! I’m looking for some YA/teen books from about 20-30 years ago please?? Doing a compare and contrast in my book club!
Hi all!
I’m looking for some YA/teen books from about 20-30 years ago please??
Doing a compare and contrast in my book club!
99 Answers
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Judy Blume?
@Laura oh of course, thank you xx
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone came out in 1997
Sweet Valley High was popular when I was a kid .
@Stacey yes I remember them!
The House on Mango Street (1984) by Sandra Cisneros
Holes (1998) by Louis Sachar
His Dark Materials (#1-3) by Philip Pullman came out in 2000
Yuki Shimmyo Dumaresq that’s depressing. Makes me feel sooo old year i read these when they came out and people are asking for books from 20 years ago as if that’s old. When i think of old books from 20-30 years ago i still think that is the 70s!
@Fiona I hear ya! ?
Did you see above — Harry Potter came out 22 years ago. It’s amazing how popular it is. An ophthalmologist in my office urged me to read them when I was like Nah that’s for kids. Lol
@Yuki 22? ??
Books by Robin McKinley
The Giver (1993) by Lois Lowry
@Yuki thank you xx
@Alis It’s funny, I grew up on Judy Blume and it’s really hard to accept how long ago the 70s and 80s were! ?
@Yuki yes I know, I was like Harry Potter?! No way is that so old, but of course it is! Judy Blume was hugely popular with my school friends x
Alis Hodgkins It’s amazing how popular HP still is. Good on JK Rowling!
@Yuki definitely, good for her! Amazing that our kids are loving it too!
Christopher Pike books
@Katie thanks x
@Katie I loved those .
Me too!
Point Horror books
@Kirsty I just found 2 in a charity shop!! Brings back memories! Xx
@Alis I LOVED them when I was a kid. I credit R.L Stine for my love of reading ?
Cynthia Voight
The Outsiders
Babysitter club, Nancy Drew,Hardy boys and I read every single VC Andrews book I could get my hands on when I was a kid . Flowers in the attic etc… plus all her others .
@Stacey oh Nancy Drew!! Flowers in the attic still remains one of my faves! Xx
Babysitters club, sweet valley high, flowers In the attic
https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/4403.Young_Adult_Series_Books_published_in_the_80s_90s
Sunfire and Silhouette books from the eighties
Sweet Valley High series
@Colleen my favourite from back in my youth lol.
@Jo me too ?
Animorphs
Check out L.J Smith, she was my favourite author as a teen, there was the secret circle, night world, and loads of others.
Summer of Fear by Lois Duncan. I read it again recently and the newer version has some updates such as the characters having cell phones which of course we didn’t have in the ‘70s. I would suggest trying to find an old edition to read.
@Stephanie thanks x
Sweet Valley High
Thank you all so much xx
Tamora Pierce & Garth Nix
The Felix Saga by Joan Aiken. I think from the 70s so a bit older than you’re asking. Or the Dalemark trilogy by Diana Wynne Jones but that is 4 books. Maybe her Fire and Hemlock. Goodnight Mr Tom by Michel M-something. Wolf by Gillian Cross
I love the Felix Saga, and Fire and Hemlock!
@Niffer You are the FIRST person I have ‘met’ who has read the Felix saga!!!! I read it ages ago so can’t really remember it, but I loooooved it. I have them on my kindle and do really want to really want to re-read them at some point. I was a big Joan Aiken fan as a child.
@Niffer You are the FIRST person I have ‘met’ who has read the Felix saga!!!! I read it ages ago so can’t really remember it, but I loooooved it. I have them on my kindle and do really want to really want to re-read them at some point. I was a big Joan Aiken fan as a child.
I am constantly recommending them when people ask about books for younger readers. They are so good and so few people seem to know them!
Strandia by Susan Lynn Reynolds, Forbidden City by William Bell, Cowboys Don’t Cry and Cowboys Don’t Quit by Marilyn Halvorson, and Tex by S.E. Hinton.
Any of S.E. Hinton’s books
Lois Duncan!!!
Babysitter’s Club, anything by Zilpha Keatly Snyder, True Confessions of Charlotte Boyle, The Witch of Blackbird Pond, Goosebumps series, Choose Your Own Adventure Books.
R.L.Stine Fear Street, Sweet Valley High, Baby-Sitters Club
I remember point romance and point horror and series called nightworld by the writer or the vampire diaries
‘Sisterhood of the Taveling Pants.’ Darn. Eighteen years. Christopher Pike? V.C. Andrews? Caroliyn Keene? Francine Pascal?
S.E. Hinton’s books
A Wrinkle in Time, Nancy Drew, Hardy Boy’s, Trixie Beldon
The outsiders
Sweet valley high, fear street, and Christopher pike young adult novels
Because of winn-dixe
Keeping the moon by sarah dessen
Goosebumps series
Alana The First Adventure by Tamora Pierce (1983).
Looking for Alibrandi ✔️
Loved this when I was younger. Bit horror/suspense
Sabriel by Garth Nix (1996)
‘Space demons’ and ‘Skymaze’ by Gillian Rubinstein.
Some of my favorite authors in those days were Harry Mazer, Norma Fox Mazer, Cynthia Voigt, and Norma Klein.
James Moloney wrote his books during the 90s and after. Most won Australian book of the year and are excellent
Goosebumps (RL Stine), anamorphs, Stranger With My Face (Louis Duncan), Remember Me (Christopher Pike), Hardy boys, Nancy drew, Harry Potter came out in the 90s as well
Some of my favorites: Lois Lowry (The Giver), Laurie Halse Anderson (Speak), Beatrice Sparks (Go Ask Alice), Orson Scott Card (Ender’s Game), Philip Pullman (The Golden Compass), and Paulo Coelho (The Alchemist). All of these authors wrote more than these, and all of these books are arguably “adult” books as well as YA. (Was YA even a category in the 1990s?) I’ve even seen Alice Walker’s The Color Purple classified as YA. Go figure.
The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton is, I think, considered the beginning of the YA genre, and that was published in 1967.
I definitely read a lot of YA in the 80s, when I was a teen. I feel like the genre today is very different from back then.
Times were so different!!! Guess I’m going back to the 80s (Pre HP) and won’t list classics like Outsiders. Sweet Valley High, Choose Your Own Adventure, Tiger Eyes, Are You There God It’s Me Margaret, BabySitters Club, Blue Ribbon horse books, Center Stage, and probably the most risque, and a bit of a classic, Go Ask Alice
and the Thoroughbred books (another horse series late 80s thru 90s)
I remember reading a lot of Christopher Pike vampire novels in the 90s
Lois Duncan
Harry Potter.
Little boy’s getting old!!
It was still written 20-30 years ago.
I know, the 20th Anniversary Edition is selling like hotcakes
Sweet Valley High
Night World by L.j Smith… The usual vampire/werewolf/shapeshifter/witch teen books 🙂 first one was 1996
@Alisha I loved night world books.
Me too ☺ still waiting for the last one though!
Right?! Ugh!
I’ll definitely be doing a reread if a date is ever announced ?
@Alisha, Same! I have to buy the first book again though; I let someone read it and she kept it. ?
One of my friends also has my first book, shes had it for like 4 years ?? she isnt much of a reader but gets like a chapter a month finished. I want the new copies anyways! Idk if you’ve seen them but they are awesome!
@Alisha, ooh I haven’t! I’ll have to check them out!
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1044852.Zoey_Fools_Around loved that series as a teen
Oh me too!!! I want to re-read them. They’re gonna seem so bad, so bad they will be good. I wonder if teens today would still enjoy them? Tis an interesting thing! Although, I think books from what is 20 years ago from today are still very accessible. The further back you go I think there is a definite difference in style and idea of what young people would like. 20 years ago you still had mobile phones and the internet.
Here’s a couple lesser known books that I liked as a teen in the mid 90s: Both Sides of Time by Caroline B Cooney (YA time travel romance) and Plainsong for Caitlin by Elizabeth M. Rees (YA historical romance).
Go Ask Alice
The Giver
Sweet Valley High books
The Three Investigators. Anything by Paul Zindel.
Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson, was published in 1999.
@Rae an excellent book.
@Paula one of my favourites! Her book Wintergirls is also amazing!!
@Rae haven’t read that one. Added to the TBR list!
@Paula definitely give it a go! Heart wrenching!
Thank you all SO much!! Xx