The 100 Best YA Books of All Time

This is one of the 759 lists we use to generate our main The Greatest Books list.

About this list

Time, 99 Books

With a panel of celebrated authors—Elizabeth Acevedo, Kacen Callender, Jenny Han, Jason Reynolds, Adam Silvera, Angie Thomas and Nicola Yoon—TIME presents the most compelling, enlightening and influential young-adult books, in chronological order beginning in the 1800s.

This list was originally published in 2021 and was added to this site over 2 years ago.

View: List Grid Table
Rank Book Authors Year Country Language Actions
93 Little Women Louisa May Alcott 1868 American English
250 Anne of Green Gables L. M. Montgomery 1908 Canadian English
244 A Tree Grows in Brooklyn Betty Smith 1943 American English
113 The Diary of a Young Girl Anne Frank 1947 Dutch Dutch
4 The Catcher in the Rye J. D. Salinger 1951 American English
52 Lord of the Flies William Golding 1954 British English
16 To Kill a Mockingbird Harper Lee 1960 American English
1941 From The Mixed Up Files Of Mrs Basil E Frankweiler EL Konigsburg 1967 American English
278 A Wizard Of Earthsea Ursula K. Le Guin 1968 American English
8032 I'll Get There. It Better Be Worth The Trip John Donovan 1969 American English
573 Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret Judy Blume 1970 American English
8189 A Hero Ain’t Nothin’ But A Sandwich Alice Childress 1973 American English
4149 Forever... Judy Blume 1975 American English
1879 Tuck Everlasting Natalie Babbitt 1975 American English
1308 Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry Mildred D. Taylor 1976 American English
2829 A Swiftly Tilting Planet Madeleine L'Engle 1978 American English
5618 The Westing Game Ellen Raskin 1978 American English
8596 Homecoming Cynthia Voigt 1981 American English
1634 The House on Mango Street Sandra Cisneros 1984 American English
7791 Weetzie Bat Francesca Lia Block 1989 American English
1799 The Giver Lois Lowry 1993 American English
3891 Ella Enchanted Gail Carson Levine 1997 American English
5232 Holes Louis Sachar 1998 American English
9975 If You Come Softly Jacqueline Woodson 1998 American English
5752 Angus, Thongs And Full Frontal Snogging Louise Rennison 1999 British English
8548 Monster Walter Dean Myers 1999 American English
3506 Speak Laurie Halse Anderson 1999 American English
8625 Stargirl Jerry Spinelli 2000 American English
4067 The Princess Diaries Meg Cabot 2000 American English
10236 A Step From Heaven An Na 2001 American English
10236 Rainbow Boys Alex Sanchez 2001 American English
6568 The Sisterhood Of The Traveling Pants Ann Brashares 2001 American English
5149 Before We Were Free Julia Alvarez 2002 American English
8814 Feed M. T. Anderson 2002 American English
670 Persepolis Marjane Satrapi 2000 French French
9050 How I Live Now Meg Rosoff 2004 British English
10797 Code Talker Joseph Bruchac 2005 American English
10797 Elsewhere Gabrielle Zevin 2005 American English
1085 The Book Thief Markus Zusak 2005 Australian English
2882 Percy Jackson and the Olympians, Book One Rick Riordan 2005 American English
3478 American Born Chinese Gene Luen Yang 2006 American English
10870 Copper Sun Sharon M. Draper 2006 American English
10870 Tyrell Coe Booth 2006 American English
8401 Graceling Kristin Cashore 2008 American English
1388 The Hunger Games Suzanne Collins 2008 American English
11215 Ship Breaker Paolo Bacigalupi 2010 American English
3489 Akata Witch Nnedi Okorafor 2011 American English
9976 Daughter Of Smoke & Bone Laini Taylor 2011 American English
9976 Legend Marie Lu 2011 American English
4145 Aristotle And Dante Discover The Secrets Of The Universe Benjamin Alire Sáenz 2012 American English
7602 Code Name Verity Elizabeth Wein 2012 British English
10100 Every Day David Levithan 2012 American English
11425 Me And Earl And The Dying Girl Jesse Andrews 2012 American English
3486 The Fault in Our Stars John Green 2012 American English
11516 If You Could Be Mine Sara Farizan 2013 Iranian English
8458 March John Lewis 2013 American English
3217 Brown Girl Dreaming Jacqueline Woodson 2014 American English
10434 I'll Give You The Sun Jandy Nelson 2014 American English
11642 Noggin John Corey Whaley 2014 American English
9054 The Crossover Kwame Alexander 2014 American English
7135 To All The Boys I've Loved Before Jenny Han 2014 American English
4190 An Ember In The Ashes Sabaa Tahir 2015 American English
11864 Dumplin' Julie Murphy 2015 American English
10623 Everything, Everything Nicola Yoon 2015 American English
11864 More Happy Than Not Adam Silvera 2015 American English
6684 Simon Vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda Becky Albertalli 2015 American English
4709 Six Of Crows Leigh Bardugo 2015 American English
10825 Salt To The Sea Ruta Sepetys 2016 American English
10825 Scythe Neal Shusterman 2016 American English
4999 The Sun Is Also A Star Nicola Yoon 2016 American English
12035 We Are The Ants Shaun David Hutchinson 2016 American English
12035 When The Moon Was Ours Anna-Marie McLemore 2016 American English
12188 Allegedly Tiffany D. Jackson 2017 American English
12188 American Street Ibi Zoboi 2017 American English
9805 Dear Martin Nic Stone 2017 American English
10942 I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter Erika L. Sánchez 2017 American English
9805 Long Way Down Jason Reynolds 2017 American English
10942 The 57 Bus Dashka Slater 2017 American English
3281 The Hate U Give Angie Thomas 2017 American English
10942 The Marrow Thieves Cherie Dimaline 2017 Canadian English
10942 We Are Okay Nina LaCour 2017 American English
12188 When Dimple Met Rishi Sandhya Menon 2017 American English
12456 A Very Large Expanse Of Sea Tahereh Mafi 2018 American English
4079 Children Of Blood And Bone Tomi Adeyemi 2018 Nigerian English
11056 Darius The Great Is Not Okay Adib Khorram 2018 Iranian-American English
12456 The Astonishing Color Of After Emily X. R. Pan 2018 American English
9311 The Poet X Elizabeth Acevedo 2018 American English
12741 Frankly In Love David Yoon 2019 American English
12741 Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me Mariko Tamaki, illustrated Rosemary Valero-O’Connell 2019 Canadian English
12741 Like A Love Story Abdi Nazemian 2019 American English
7189 Pet Akwaeke Emezi 2019 American English
12741 With The Fire On High Elizabeth Acevedo 2019 American English
11218 The Black Flamingo Dean Atta 2019 British English
13249 Felix Ever After Kacen Callender 2020 American English
13249 Stamped Ibram X. Kendi, Jason Reynolds 2020 American English
13249 The Henna Wars Adiba Jaigirdar 2020 Irish English
13249 We Are Not Free Traci Chee 2020 American English
13249 You Should See Me In A Crown Leah Johnson 2020 American English
10600 Firekeeper's Daughter Angeline Boulley 2021 American English