Here are 93 books that When Life Gives You Mangos fans have personally recommended if you like
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One of the things I love most about fiction is the way it allows you to “be” different people—to experience, think, feel, and behave from inside a particular temperament, worldview, or experience. My very favorite is adding the complexity of multiple perspectives to that magic trick so that you get to live inside two or more people who may be at complete odds with each other. Reading good fiction is an exercise in empathy, and reading good fiction from multiple viewpoints is empathy supercharged. I’ve loved that immersion since I was a little kid who believed there was nothing better than a novel.
This novel is an immersive read with heaps of empathy for all its characters but especially for the two sisters whose perspectives are at the center of the story: the twin who disappears to live a secret life, passing as white, and the twin left behind.
We don’t get the perspective of Stella, the vanished twin, until 14 years after her disappearance, 150 pages into the book. By then, I was fully absorbed in the grief and unanswered questions of the people she’d abandoned, eager to finally know where she’d been all this time and to understand her complex motivations and the emotional and mental toll of relinquishing—and hiding—her racial identity, her community, her sister, and her past. I picked this book up and didn’t put it down until it was done.
THE SUNDAY TIMES TOP BESTSELLER #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE LONGLISTED FOR THE ORWELL PRIZE
'An utterly mesmerising novel..I absolutely loved this book' Bernardine Evaristo, winner of the Booker Prize 2019
'Epic' Kiley Reid, O, The Oprah Magazine
'Favourite book [of the] year' Issa Rae
The Vignes twin sisters will always be identical. But after growing up together in a small, southern black community and running away at age sixteen, it's not just the shape of their daily lives that is different as adults, it's everything: their families, their communities, their racial identities. Ten years…
I’m an award-winning author whose books are all set on my beautiful island of Barbados. Reading and writing have always been a part of my life and I’m obsessed with books that explore other cultures and lifestyles. There’s nothing more intoxicating than reading about new foods and new environments all interconnected by our shared humanity. They could be fantasy books with great world-building or literary fiction that explore a tiny Asian city I never heard about. All of these incredible books have influenced my writing and expanded my knowledge of the world around me.
This book was mandatory reading for most of us going to the Caribbean in secondary school.
For that reason, it may elicit a groan from those who have less than pleasant memories of school-enforced reading. But for me, it really was the first time I remember reading a book set in my home country of Barbados.
It’s a heart-warming coming-of-age story that takes you back and makes you wish for the good old days.
Nearly forty years after its initial publication, George Lamming's In the Castle of My Skin is considered a classic narrative of the Black colonial experience. This poetic autobiographical novel juxtaposes the undeveloped, unencumbered life of a small Caribbean island with the materialism and anxiety of the twentieth century.
Written when Lamming was twenty-three and residing in England, In the Castle of My Skin poignantly chronicles the author's life from his ninth to his nineteenth year. Through the eyes of a young boy the experiences of colonial education, class tensions, and natural disaster are interpreted and reinterpreted, mediated through the presence…
I’m an award-winning author whose books are all set on my beautiful island of Barbados. Reading and writing have always been a part of my life and I’m obsessed with books that explore other cultures and lifestyles. There’s nothing more intoxicating than reading about new foods and new environments all interconnected by our shared humanity. They could be fantasy books with great world-building or literary fiction that explore a tiny Asian city I never heard about. All of these incredible books have influenced my writing and expanded my knowledge of the world around me.
This story is a remarkable tale of family, love, loss, and belonging. And it’s also based on a true story!
The book was so rich and well done. The author does a remarkable job of taking the reader to 1940s to 1960s Trinidad.
Marcia Garcia works as a seamstress while raising two small boys as she attracts the interest of a dashing policeman. Marrying him complicates her life and eventually starts to unravel the family secret that she has been safeguarding for years.
The New York Times Sunday Book Review Shortlist Black Caucus of the American Library Association 2015 Honor Book in Fiction Booklist Starred Review O, The Oprah Magazine "10 Titles to Pick Up Now"
A glorious and moving multigenerational, multicultural saga that sweeps from the 1940s through the 1960s in Trinidad and the United States. 'Til the Well Runs Dry opens in a seaside village in the north of Trinidad, where young Marcia Garcia, a gifted and smart-mouthed sixteen-year-old seamstress, lives alone, raising two small boys and guarding a family secret. When she meets Farouk Karam,…
Eleven-year-old Sierra just wants a normal life. After her military mother returns from the war overseas, the two hop from home to homelessness while Sierra tries to help her mom through the throes of PTSD.
I’m an award-winning author whose books are all set on my beautiful island of Barbados. Reading and writing have always been a part of my life and I’m obsessed with books that explore other cultures and lifestyles. There’s nothing more intoxicating than reading about new foods and new environments all interconnected by our shared humanity. They could be fantasy books with great world-building or literary fiction that explore a tiny Asian city I never heard about. All of these incredible books have influenced my writing and expanded my knowledge of the world around me.
Probably one of the darker reads on my list but, man! This Trinidadian book delivers such top-notch story-telling that you’ll ask yourself why you don’t read more Caribbean fiction.
This book also looks at twins but the choices are taken out of their hands and placed in those of their parents. The author injected it with a bit of humour but it’s also a tear-jerker in the end. I highly recommend.
A TIMES AND EVENING STANDARD BOOK OF THE YEAR WINNER OF THE DESMOND ELLIOTT PRIZE 2019 WINNER OF THE AUTHORS' CLUB FIRST NOVEL AWARD WINNER OF THE MCKITTERICK PRIZE 2020 ONE OF THE BBC'S '100 NOVELS THAT SHAPED OUR WORLD' LONGLISTED FOR THE JHALAK PRIZE AND THE EDINBURGH FESTIVAL FIRST BOOK AWARD
WINNER OF BARNES & NOBLE'S 2019 DISCOVER NEW WRITERS PRIZE
'So hard to put down.' Daily Mail
'Startling . . . Remarkable.' Economist
'Right away I was utterly absorbed.' Sarah Jessica Parker
One father. Two sons. An impossible choice.
When thirteen-year-old Paul doesn't return home one afternoon, even…
I wrote Uncle Bobby’s Wedding in 2005, just after same-sex marriage became legal in Massachusetts. It was published in 2008 and immediately became the target of anti-LGBT attacks. Many people attempted to ban it. Some went so far as to burn it – and then they wrote totell me they had. It was one of the most challenged books in the country that year, and it was one of the 100 most-challenged books of the decade. I have been deeply involved with LGBTQ+ picture books ever since.
The main character, a little boy named Raphael, loves his friend Jerome. And Raphael loves Jerome for good reasons – Jerome makes him feel protected, Jerome holds his hand, “Jerome always sees me, even when he’s with his friends.” Despite a little opposition from Raphael’s parents, this is the warmest of books about how sweet and life-affirming the love between two children can be.
"Raphael loves Jerome. I say it. It's easy."
This story follows a little boy named Raphael, whose daily rhythm is steeped in his immense affection for his friend Jerome. The two boys share jokes and snacks and plan future adventures to the Himalayas. Even when Raphael's constant talk of Jerome is driving his parents crazy, he remains steadfast: "Raphael loves Jerome. I can say it. It's easy." And the truth is, when he's with Jerome, Raphael feels happy, liked, and understood- even special. Thomas Scotto's simple, strong, and insightful prose and Olivier Tallec's delightful, expressive illustrations give much emotion and…
I have always felt like a bit of a misfit. I was taller, bigger, and clumsier than the other kids. I listened to the wrong music, wore the wrong clothes, and read the wrong books. I wasn’t cool. And when I became a high school teacher, I saw many kids, especially young women, who I could see felt the same. When Young Adult literature came into its own, I really loved all the wonderful ways YA stories were telling the stories of the kids who didn’t fit in, and it made me want to read them, and eventually write one of my own.
I was teaching high school when this novel came out over twenty years ago, and it immediately struck a chord with me, and with my students. This story of a lifelong friendship and the pain that comes with growing up has so many great characters. But Carmen has always been my favorite. The relationship with her father, her emergence into the (literal) spotlight, and her willingness to speak her mind to her loved ones, make her, for me, the true heroine of this novel. One of my favorite moments is her surprise and wonder when the pants actually fit her, not just her skinny friends. The idea that she had access to all the things they did, regardless of her size, is a beautiful metaphor for living.
Carmen, Tibby, Lena and Bridget have been best friends all their lives. They live in the same small American town and usually spend every moment of their long summer holidays together. The year they turn 16 is the first time they have separate plans for the summer but the girls are determined to keep in touch. Tibby buys a pair of jeans in a second-hand shop and the girls discover that the trousers magically fit each of them perfectly, despite their different figures and heights. They hit upon a wonderful plan of sharing the jeans throughout the vacation - sending…
Taking only what they can quickly pack, 11-year-old Mardella and her mom secretly move away from their abusive home to start a fresh life in Haven, MN. But Mardella’s sure she's to blame—if only she hadn’t dialed 911, her dad wouldn’t be in jail, her mom wouldn't have been fired,…
As an author of horror and thrillers, I have always been drawn to big mysteries, the darker the better. I blame this fascination on my love of David Lynch movies, which had originated in my early teens and persists to this day. I have also found that incorporating ‘found objects’ into mixed media narratives can help better simulate reality while also twisting it in unpredictable ways. It is no surprise that my debut What the Woods Keep is a mixed media genre-bender. While this storytelling method is not new, recent horror novels have used it in incredibly inventive and impactful ways.
A recent addition to the horror genre, this excellent debut novel excels in creating a surreal narrative drenched in dark atmosphere. To Break a Covenant centers around a terrifying, fractured faux-documentary about a town under control of a sinister presence. I dare you to read creepy descriptions of ‘found’ footage and not feel a chill as this mystery unfolds.
Debut voice Alison Ames delivers with a chilling, feminist thriller, perfect for fans of Wilder Girls and Sawkill Girls.
Moon Basin has been haunted for as long as anyone can remember. It started when an explosion in the mine killed sixteen people. The disaster made it impossible to live in town, with underground fires spewing ash into the sky. But life in New Basin is just as fraught. The ex-mining town relies on its haunted reputation to bring in tourists, but there's more truth to the rumors than most are willing to admit, and the mine still has a hold…
Of all the lessons that we should be teaching kids, I think kindness should be at the top of everyone’s list. If people treated every human and sentient being with kindness and compassion the world would be a better place, which is something we all want. The more we can illustrate this for children the better so that they can understand that we are all in this together and that everyone deserves respect.
I love this charming book aboutthe kindness that comes with friendship. Pen drawings accompany the text, which is at certain times silly, other times fun, and at the best of times poignant. Point in case:
“And I like you because
When I am feeling sad you don’t always cheer me up right away
Sometimes it is better to be sad."
I’m not sure every child would understand the significance of that sentence. But the words at some point in their lives will come back around. The book lists reasons why we like our friends, namely because they offer us kindness and empathy when we are down. And when we are up, they take pleasure in the moment right alongside us – a valuable lesson for kids.
This classic and funny hardcover picture book is the perfect way to say I like you.
A deeply affectionate celebration of all the reasons we like each other, here is the book that Romeo would have given Juliet, Charlie Brown would have given Snoopy, and you can give to some very special friend.
This book expresses the true meaning of friendship in a long list of ways with charming accompanying illustrations by Jacqueline Chwast. For example: I like you because you know where I'm ticklish, and you don't tickle me there except just a little tiny bit sometimes!
I always used food to cope with painful feelings, and I developed Binge Eating Disorder as a child. As an adult, I was in therapy to deal with traumatic stuff, and I lost 100 pounds. I finished therapy with a whole new set of tools with which to navigate the world, but I still regained the weight and started hating myself again. I said, “Whoa. Time-out. I am worthy of love. That has not changed, so why do I hate myself again?” That is what I explore in Big Fat Disaster: what is our worth, and why should that worth depend on what we look like?
Jeff Zentner’s writing is lyrical and beautiful and indescribably wonderful (although I just tried to describe it and failed). Goodbye Days deals in such a raw way with grief and regret—to feel the feelings instead of avoiding them—and learn to face hard realities without much support, at least at first. Check out Goodbye Days and all of Jeff’s amazing books. You will go on an emotional journey as his characters make hard choices and face new beginnings.
'Gorgeous, heartbreaking, and ultimately life-affirming' Nicola Yoon
'Hold on to your heart: this book will wreck you, fix you, and most definitely change you' Becky Albertalli
Can a text message destroy your life?
Carver Briggs never thought a simple text would cause a fatal crash, killing his three best friends, Mars, Eli, and Blake. Now Carver can't stop blaming himself for the accident and even worse, there could be a criminal investigation into the deaths.
Then Blake's grandmother asks Carver to remember her grandson with a 'goodbye day' together. Carver has his misgivings, but he starts to help the families…
I’ve been drawing and writing ever since I could hold a pencil, and a big inspiration for me to start my lifelong creative journey were graphic novels. So even as an adult, I love to read work from a wide range of genres and age ranges to see what my fellow authors and artists are up to. Especially making my own middle grade graphic novel series, I look up to so many of the authors and artists on this list and chances are you and your kids will too if you pick one of these up!
Making Friends is a fun, thoughtful graphic novel that overflows with creativity!
It centers around a middle schooler who feels lonely so she uses a magic sketchbook to design her dream best friend and to her surprise- she becomes real! It brings me right back to the days of doodling for hours on end and dreaming of all the possibilities of the future! It’s also a good message for young readers that even the most hard-to-express emotions can be worked out through art.
Even as an adult it’s inspired me to keep drawing and keep dreaming.
A heart-warming graphic novel that thoughtfully explores friendship, family and school issues. Danielle needs a perfect friend, but sometimes making (or creating) one is a lot easier than keeping one!
Sixth grade was SO much easier for Dany - she knew exactly what to expect out of life.
Now that she's in seventh grade, she's in a new middle school, her friends are in different classes and forming new cliques, and she is totally lost.
What Dany really needs is a new best friend!
So when she inherits a magic sketchbook, she draws Madison, the most amazing, perfect, and awesome…
