What Are The Best Books With Unrequited Love For Young Adults?

So. I love free YA books. 'BookBub’s free deals' – lots of samples for books like Throne of Glass. Also there’s loads of Fanfiction on Fanfiction.net (right now I’m in the middle of reading Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality. 1500 pages and going). Inkshares have free chapters for original books – I’ve looked at The Disasters. Open Library let me digitally ‘borrow’ and download Percy Jacksons. (No waitlist, which is great). And on Reddit, there’s a daily post of free e-books on r/FreeEBOOKS. They have loads of fantasy and contemporary books.

Jealousy is kind of the root of so much of sports romance. Athletes are typically super competitive, so there's already that rivalry element in place. Plus most sports have a really close knit team, so everyone knows each other’s business. And then there’s the fans. In Kulti by Mariana Zapata, the jealousy is slowly revealed because the main character is a retired soccer star turned coach, and the other main character is on his team of young female soccer players. This means that initially any sign of jealousy is squashed under his respect for her, his ages difference from her, and his overall grumpy demeanor. But every now and again his jealousy will peek through in the form of very protective actions, and somewhat rude comments. It’s all very tense because of the power dynamics at play here, and the fact that they have to keep their relationship a secret, so every time his professionalism wavers it’s a huge deal. And it pays off in legendary fashion.

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Of course, there are other massive children’s book publishers like Scholastic (so extensively entrenched in schools and book fairs that it’s sort of surreal). But in terms of prestige and literary distinction, I’d rank Penguin Random House (Knopf Books for Young Readers, G.P. Putnam’s Sons Books for Young Readers, etc.) above the rest. And then there’s HarperCollins Children’s Books, with its enormous backlist. But really, Macmillan and Simon & Schuster are the two other big players in the traditional publishing world. But again, this is corporate, publishing-bigwigs stuff. The actual YA publishing world is a bunch of passionate, idiosyncratic individual editors who happen to work for these various companies. The logos on the spines of the published books are pretty irrelevant.

There’s a tremendous amount of love for humor as a genre driver. A book that makes people laugh has a devout and persisitent reader base, often from crossover audiences (fans of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, for example). Humor can also be witty and winning, especially in books with lots of dialogue in the romantic comedy genre and beyond. And even when humor is used to explore tough, serious topics, popular and successful YA authors like David Yoon and Mary HK Choi and Phil Stamper use humor to fantastic end in their work. I believe a funny YA book can rise above the rest in a crowded field of books because most people seek out authentic experiences of joy and are willing to spread the word to others when they encounter something humorous. This can be a very difficult talent to master above the typical plot device, so it makes the books that are laughing their way to the top all the more impressive.

I’ve read recently – with much pleasure – The Pisces by Melissa Broder. As I said earlier, Notes on Heartbreak is a deeply emotional read and whilst The Pisces is a vastly different book, it also deals with the depths of heartbreak and the journey of the person left to pick up the pieces after. The book is wild and crazy and at times surreal, but it’s also very real and is a very humorous take on the typical heartbreak stories that we read about. Annie Lord is another author who tackles tough subject matters with honesty and Unflinching courage in her writing. For an even more twisted take on relationships, you have to read Exciting Times by Naoise Dolan. The book is a smart and quirky dissection of the stresses of dating in your 30s and follows a protagonist as conflicted and as stuck in limbo as the narrator of Notes on Heartbreak. It’s fun and often laugh-out-loud and the dry humor has got me reading passages aloud to my flatmates to get their take. Even more, though, it’s good to have this sort of relatable take on a series of relationships, whole from the really bad to the just plain stumped. If you are looking for something a little more lyrical but equally painful, I highly recommend Graham Greene’s classic The End of the Affair. The story is of a man whose obsessive love of a woman that ended in an affair culminates in her unexpected death, and in the years that follow, he struggles with his jealousy, anger and conflicts with his Christian faith. As with Notes on Heartbreak, the novel is intense and leaves its reader shaken. It is a stunning exploration of love, and is written with incredible precision and beauty. Finally, I picked How to Love a Jamaican by Alexia Arthurs because it’s different but also explores themes of love. This is a collection of short stories that follow a variety of characters, all dealing with love and relationships in different ways, from identities of families and cultures to how people are dealing with being diasporic. I find that this book is similar to Notes on Heartbreak in that the emotional range of the stories goes from extreme love to extreme hate, and in between there is a lot of love and it is so beautiful and relatable that it will make you feel all the emotions and hopefully see a little bit of yourself in the characters. Like with Notes on Heartbreak, reading How to Love a Jamaican will leave you feeling wrecked but better in the end.

One of the most satisfying historical romances to read is one that defies most expectations of the genre. Courtney Milan’s The Duke Who Didn’t is a Regency romance about a Chinese-British duke who falls for a woman from a Hakka village in rural England. The woman makes sauce for a living. The book is joyful and funny and treats with depth the realities of being a person of color in 19th century England without letting that become too depressing for the romance at hand. The historical research about Hakka communities in England is great and very fresh. The novel follows the long-held crush of a man on a woman. He secretly identifies with her, and they share a common cultural heritage. It is a very warm, clever, and deeply romantic novel, which explores in a thoughtful manner the history of a people of color in a bygone era. In short, a perfect escape read that is also very perceptive.

Use Common Sense Media’s website to review books. You can type in any book and get a detailed summary of the book including any romantic moments, language, etc. and a maturity level rating. I rely on this for many of the books I purchase for my kids as I don’t always read the reviews on Amazon as they can vary greatly. Follow librarians and teachers on social media (TikTok/BookTok has a huge ‘clean teen romance’ and ‘middle grade’ community) as they are on the front lines and know what is currently publishing and what kids are actually reading and enjoying as opposed to what is winning awards.

You might be afraid in places where the Black John entity turns up. In the dark of sinister rituals. When you are being hunted. But you will never be haunted by anything in the pages of the Miss Peregrine novels. That would be traumatic horror and a terrible way to be entertained. What I mean is that the fear that you will experience reading these books is fun and exciting. It is a roller coaster ride of safe scares that can be really thrilling. For a YA reader, this novel is the perfect introduction to darker material. Instead of graphically showing how terrible things are, the author relies on psychological and atmospheric horror. This helps the reader understand how to deal with the fear evoked by fiction in a healthy way.

I’m really opposed to this idea of shy people only needing romance to be fulfilled in fiction. I’d much rather suggest a great fantasy or sci-fi novel with a focus on really deep platonic relationships, growth, and adventure, without any romance. No pressure to feel the characters’ romantic feelings or to imagine yourself in their shoes. The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison is a great example of a really shy, kind, gentle protagonist who finds his way into a position of great power and then tries to earn respect while building a family made up of secretaries, bodyguards, and other friends. It’s a really growth-oriented story with a focus on how a decent person can navigate a difficult, cutthroat court, and I think it’s more nourishing for a quiet evening than any love story.