10 Great Coming-of-Age Novels

I think that summer is the perfect time to read coming-of-age novels (my past summers on this blog were all about such books as The Interestings, Golden Child, Fruit of the Drunken Tree, and Arturo’s Island), and below is my personal list of ten great coming-of-age novels (a Bildungsroman). Summer is usually linked to childhood and growing up (at least in my mind): the sense of freedom after school is over, grass picnics and summer camps. Charles Dickens (David Copperfield), Mark Twain (The Adventures of Tom Sawyer), J. D. Salinger (The Catcher in the Rye), and Louisa May Alcott (Little Women) are just a few of the authors I used to read who all wrote about the pains of growing up and finding oneself in the world, capturing that curious transition between the magical world of childhood and the “harsh” world of adults, that is full of responsibilities. The list below includes my other old favourites and more-or-less-recently-discovered modern classics.

I. The Little Friend [2002]

by Donna Tartt

The focus of this evocative novel by Donna Tartt is twelve-year-old Harriet Dufresnes living in Mississippi who becomes obsessed with tracking down the murderer of her brother Robin twelve years prior. Her passion for justice leads her on the progressively dangerous journey of confronting the town’s criminals and the people she believes are responsible for her brother’s death. Tartt fuses the southern mystery with the wonder and investigative adventures of childhood tainted by trauma and thrown in at the deep end.

II. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn [1943]

by Betty Smith

This American classic tells of eleven-year-old Frances Nolan who lives in a Brooklyn tenement with her hardworking mother, loving, but alcoholic father and little brother. Despite the poverty around her, Frances loves books and dreams “big”, seeing the world around her change as her ambitions grow, but tragedies multiply. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn must be one of the greatest coming-of-age books, and I also highly recommend Elia Kazan’s 1945 film adaptation of this novel.

III. How Do You Live? [1937]

by Genzaburo Yoshino

This book was the highlight of my reading last year, and Hayao Miyazaki’s new animation of 2023 will be loosely based on it. The main character of the story is Junichi Honda (“Copper”), a middle-grader whose situation at school and relationship with his close friends open his eyes on the many wrongs and injustices that life can throw at a person. This is a gentle, kind book about growing up while staying true to oneself, one’s principles and beliefs.

IV. Never Let Me Go [2005]

by Kazuo Ishiguro

No list of great coming-of-age novels can miss this book by Kazuo Ishiguro (The Remains of the Day, Klara & The Sun). The story of three children and then teenagers and young adults, Kathy, Ruth and Tommy, who form a special bond while attending Hailsham, a boarding school, but who are then forced to confront unbelievable conditions devoid of freedom, rights and personal will is heart-breaking and unputdownable. It is said that Ishiguro thought up the interesting relationship between the three youngsters first and could not initially place them in any context, but his final idea of one brutal dystopian regime whereby some children are specifically raised to be adult organ donors for others is certainly not easily forgotten.

V. My Ántonia [1918]

by Willa Cather

“In the course of twenty crowded years one parts with many illusions. I did not wish to lose the early ones. Some memories are realities, and are better than anything that can ever happen to one again” (Willa Cather, My Ántonia).

This a touching, deeply nostalgic story of one immigrant family in America and its star – vivacious girl Ántonia, who came to define our boy protagonist’s childhood and his outlook on life. This is easily one of the best books I read this year (thanks to Roger and FictionFan for their recommendations), and must be Willa Cather’s best work. Her novel A Lost Lady is also a great book that can be considered a coming-of-age novel.

VI. A Kestrel for a Knave [1968]

by Barry Hines

This coming-of-age book takes place in South Yorkshire in the 1960s and follows working-class boy Billy Casper who is bullied both at home and in school. When Billy takes up the hobby of falconry and domesticates a kestrel, he is finally feeling like he knows something no one else does and that he has made a special connection with someone. The short book details the traumas of childhood and attempts at finding a friend, a comfort and a calling. Ken Loach’s adapted film Kes is one of my all-time favourite films.

VII. The Virgin Suicides [1993]

by Jeffrey Eugenides

This debut book set in the 1970s Michigan follows the lives of five sisters of one religious family, as told by their neighbours, teenage boys. The girls, Cecilia, Lux, Bonnie, Mary, and Therese, are typical teenagers, but their longing for connection and understanding eventually leads to tragic consequences. The novel captures the “first love” torments and sexual awakening, as well as the darker side of the adolescence, including the anxiety, melancholia and misunderstanding. Sofia Coppola’s 1999 film based on this book must be one of the most faithful and moving book-to-film adaptations.

VIII. How Green Was My Valley [1939]

by Richard Llewellyn

I praised this book often enough last year, but, really, no praise is ever enough for it. Richard Llewellyn’s moving story about boy Hew Morgan living in a coal-mining community in Wales in the late Victorian era is a “must-read”. Bitter-sweet and eye-opening, it is also a lyrical tribute to Wales, its people and its history.

IX. Childhood, Boyhood, Youth [1857]

by Leo Tolstoy

This a charming, vivid semi-autobiographical book-trilogy telling of “childhood, boyhood and youth” of boy Nikolenka, who moves to a Moscow apartment with his German tutor, but then, the death of his mother and certain realisations about his father force him to confront the adult life early, as he later prepares for his university exams and tries to blend in with his peers. It is a coming-of-age novel through and through, filled with awakenings about the grown-up world and emerging anxieties about the future.

X. The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole [1982]

by Sue Townsend

Alongside Dickens, Twain, Stevenson and London, this coming-of-age novel has to be among my very first in the coming-of-age genre, and, most likely, I did read this diary-book when I was aged thirteen and three-quarters/a half, too, the same age as the main character, British teenager Adrian Mole. What I remember most vividly from the book is Adrian’s school trip, his relationship with his girlfriend Pandora and his “never-ending” wait for a letter from the BBC (he wanted to be a poet/writer).

Some notable coming-of-age novels that are on my TBR list are Carson McCullers’s The Member of the Wedding, Dodie Smith’s I Capture the Castle and Ray Bradbury’s Dandelion Wine. Do you have a favourite coming-of-age book?

30 thoughts on “10 Great Coming-of-Age Novels”

            1. Yes, it definitely says now that the film story is totally original and unconnected to the book! I agree, it doesn’t make much sense. I guess Miyazaki will honour the book by mentioning it in the film and touching on some of its themes. It is even more puzzling to me since the original title in Japanese remains the same – How Do You Live?, but then why such a title in Japanese if it is not an adaptation? The English title is “The Boy and the Heron”. Apparently, it is still a coming-of-age story and will have some of Miyazaki’s own childhood in there, but even so, I was SO looking forward to the actual book adaptation…Eh.

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  4. Diane, thanks for the detailed list. A very interesting selection.
    I agree that, indeed, summer is associated with the possibility of understanding what is happening in the lives of adolescents, since there is time for this during school holidays, it is associated with freedom and the opportunity to explore the world.
    I remember that the strongest impression on me in my childhood was made by A. N. Rybakov’s trilogy “Dagger”, “Bronze Bird”, “Shot”. Also attracts the form – a detective.
    Unfortunately, I didn’t read in my childhood, but when I read to my children, I was completely shocked by the bright images of childhood, uncomplicated doubts, fears and grief, in Astrid Lindren’s trilogy “We are all children from Bullerby”,
    “Again about children from Bullerby”, “Having fun in Bullerby”. Perhaps, I have not read a brighter book about childhood.
    As a teenager, she was impressed by Arkady Gaidar’s book “The Fate of a Drummer”. I remember that I was struck by the fact that the main character was very real, not only with the right character traits and motives, but also with the most crooked and wrong thoughts and actions. All this coexisted very closely in him and was true, as in life. Perhaps, I encountered such a main character then for the first time.
    Of course, one cannot fail to recall the novel “Two Captains” by Veniamin Kaverin, which I read as a teenager.
    And already in high school, she could not tear herself away from the novel by Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky “Teenager” about the difficult fate of a growing young man, an illegitimate noble son. I re-read this book many times at different ages – it is a storehouse of images and thoughts for any person, especially growing up. Read in one breath. I can recommend an excellent six-episode film adaptation of Yevgeny Tashkov’s 1983 novel. The film can be watched over and over again.

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    1. Thank you very much for these recommendations! What treasures! I am sure to seek out Rybakov’s books now and the book by Lindgren. I always loved Karlsson and Pippi, and I think I still have The Brothers Lionheart on my TBR list. I read Kaverin’s Two Captains, and Gaidar’s Chuk and Gek and Timur and His Squad, too, but I cannot recall having read The Fate of a Drummer, thanks. I am also adding Dostoevsky’s Teenager on my list to read books, sounds great, again thank you!

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  7. I hope you enjoy I Capture the Castle, it’s one of my favourites and the film is great too – they work together brilliantly. One of my favourites that I read recently was Young Anne by Dorothy Whipple, her first novel and not up there with the best but I hold Anne very dearly!

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  9. Very good choices, Diana, I am glad you included “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn,” which sometimes does not get the credit it deserves. Betty Smith was a very good writer. I have only seen the film “How Green Was My Valley,” which was beautifully done. And, oh yes, “Childhood, Boyhood, and Youth”: a marvelous work; is flawless the right word?

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  10. Oh I loved The Little Friend, it totally surprised me how drawn into it I became and such a long book as well. Fascinating list. I would add The Country Girls to the list, though it is more of a dim view on growing up.
    I am very interested in the Studio Ghibli adaptation of How Do You Live.

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  11. I just discovered your blog and am sharing it with my Italian class and my book club.

    I would like to recommend An Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian by Sherman Alexie as a coming of age suggestion.

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