66 books like You'll Miss Me When I'm Gone

By Rachel Lynn Solomon,

Here are 66 books that You'll Miss Me When I'm Gone fans have personally recommended if you like You'll Miss Me When I'm Gone. Shepherd is a community of 12,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl

Johanna van Zanten Author Of The Imposter

From my list on how the Second World War affected regular people and their families.

Why am I passionate about this?

As a child with older sisters, I read their books beyond my age level under the blankets with a flashlight in bed at night. I became a reading addict. Raised in The Netherlands with the Second World War casting its large shadow on our lives, I only became interested, after my parents were gone, in how people survived and had to find their courage under impossible circumstances. They would never talk about those occupation years. My search into history led me to find the answers.

Johanna's book list on how the Second World War affected regular people and their families

Johanna van Zanten Why did Johanna love this book?

I loved this non-fiction book, and reading it, I often broke down in tears, realizing this personal and innocent true teenage story was all leading up to the tremendous death of millions of innocent people.

This is the only Anne Frank book that I recommend to everybody from a young age. It is THE introduction to the real events of World War 2.

By Anne Frank, B.M. Mooyaart (translator),

Why should I read it?

11 authors picked Anne Frank as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 14, 15, 16, and 17.

What is this book about?

With 30 per cent more material than previous editions, this new contemporary and fully anglicized translation gives the reader a deeper insight into Anne's world. Publication of the unabridged Definitive Edition on Penguin Audiobook, read by Helena Bonham-Carter, coincides.


Book cover of The Poet X

Jennifer De Leon Author Of Borderless

From my list on Latina latine authors I wish I had read as a teen.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am convinced that my life would be better if I had read more books by Latina/Latine authors while growing up. To be able to see oneself in a story is powerful. I didn’t have that for a long time. It made me feel invisible. It made me feel like being an author was as realistic as becoming an astronaut or a performer in Cirque du Soleil. Now, as a professor of Creative Writing and author of several books (and more on the way!), I dedicated my life to writing the books I needed as a young Latina. I hope others find something meaningful in my stories, too.

Jennifer's book list on Latina latine authors I wish I had read as a teen

Jennifer De Leon Why did Jennifer love this book?

I felt so seen in this story. Elizabeth Acevedo paints a spectacular character (Xiomara) who is caught between worlds—the “old” world of her parents and their strict traditions and the “new” world where she can perform spoken word poetry on stage.

I laughed and cried as I read this book, which was told in verse, especially regarding Xiomara’s relationship with her mother. I could relate so much to Xiomara and the arguments she got into with her mother. I was reminded of my own adolescence and the many fights I had with my mom. It’s all good now, but wow. We used to really get into it during those rocky years.

By Elizabeth Acevedo,

Why should I read it?

7 authors picked The Poet X as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 12, 13, 14, and 15.

What is this book about?

WINNER OF THE THE CILIP CARNEGIE MEDAL 2019
SHORTLISTED FOR THE WATERSTONES CHILDREN'S BOOK PRIZE 2019
THE WINNER OF THE 2018 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD
THE WINNER OF THE MICHAEL L.PRINTZ AWARD
THE WINNER OF THE PURA BELPRE AWARD
THE WINNER OF THE BOSTON GLOBE-HORNBOOK AWARD

'I fell in love at slam poetry. This one will stay with you a long time.' - Angie Thomas, bestselling author of The Hate U Give

'This was the type of book where "I'll just do 50 pages" turned into finishing it in 2 reads. I felt very emotional, not just because the story and…


Book cover of Eliza and Her Monsters

Annie Wood Author Of Just a Girl in the Whirl

From my list on teen girls finding themself in the midst of chaos.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a Hollywood native, writer/actor/mixed-media artist/creative compulsive. When I was a kid, I was really close to my older brother who was an addict. Unfortunately he never stopped using and died too young. I dealt with it by allowing the experience to inspire me. In my recent young adult novel, Just a Girl in the Whirl, the father character is inspired by him. I express myself through all art forms in order to make my way in the world and I love reading about other female characters who do the same! I’m a lifelong optimist and I love feeling inspired and inspiring others to love themselves, find the humor in everything, and create! 

Annie's book list on teen girls finding themself in the midst of chaos

Annie Wood Why did Annie love this book?

It’s about a girl, Eliza, who created a super successful webcomic. IRL, Eliza is shy and withdrawn so when she meets a boy who loves her comics she doesn’t tell him that she’s the creator. This book is so now and reminds me of the importance of showing your true self and embracing your gifts. 

By Francesca Zappia,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Eliza and Her Monsters as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 13, 14, 15, and 16.

What is this book about?

"A love letter to fandom, friendship, and the stories that shape us, Eliza and Her Monsters is absolutely magical."-Marieke Nijkamp, New York Times-bestselling author of This Is Where It Ends


Eighteen-year-old Eliza Mirk is the anonymous creator of the wildly popular webcomic Monstrous Sea, but when a new boy at school tempts her to live a life offline, everything she's worked for begins to crumble.

Rainbow Rowell's Fangirl meets Noelle Stevenson's Nimona in this acclaimed novel about art, fandom, and finding the courage to be yourself. "A must-have."-School Library Journal

In the real world, Eliza Mirk is shy, weird, and…


Book cover of How to Make Friends with the Dark

Annie Wood Author Of Just a Girl in the Whirl

From my list on teen girls finding themself in the midst of chaos.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a Hollywood native, writer/actor/mixed-media artist/creative compulsive. When I was a kid, I was really close to my older brother who was an addict. Unfortunately he never stopped using and died too young. I dealt with it by allowing the experience to inspire me. In my recent young adult novel, Just a Girl in the Whirl, the father character is inspired by him. I express myself through all art forms in order to make my way in the world and I love reading about other female characters who do the same! I’m a lifelong optimist and I love feeling inspired and inspiring others to love themselves, find the humor in everything, and create! 

Annie's book list on teen girls finding themself in the midst of chaos

Annie Wood Why did Annie love this book?

Tiger is a teenage girl who suddenly loses her mother. It’s a real, heartfelt, and painfully sad book, so be warned! This book made me look into my own losses and remember that grief is not a one size fits all experience and that there’s no way to avoid the sadness. To get through it we must keep going. I think it’s a beautifully written and important book for all who are grieving.

By Kathleen Glasgow,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked How to Make Friends with the Dark as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 14, 15, 16, and 17.

What is this book about?

From the New York Times bestselling author of Girl in Pieces comes a novel about love and loss and learning how to continue when it feels like you're surrounded by darkness that Karen M. McManus, the New York Times bestselling author of One of Us Is Lying, calls "rare and powerful."

Here is what happens when your mother dies.

It's the brightest day of summer and it's dark outside. It's dark in your house, dark in your room, and dark in your heart. You feel like the darkness is going to split you apart.

That's how it feels for Tiger.…


Book cover of My Sister's Grave

Arthur Coburn Author Of Murder in Concrete

From my list on women facing dark and dangerous obstacles.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am an ex-lawyer, ex-army officer, and ex-Hollywood film editor who loves stories about females in danger who dig deep to solve problems and survive. I can’t claim to be an expert, but I marvel at the breadth of female styles–from delicate, feminine, and sweet to brave, adventuresome, and tough. I have edited films about various women characters, from Charlize Theron’s killer in Monster to Cate Blanchett’s spiritual medium in The Gift and Diane Lane’s brave romantic survivor in Under the Tuscan Sun. I have three successful step granddaughters: an accountant, a lawyer, and one getting a PhD in computer studies. Smart, talented, and interesting women people in my life.

Arthur's book list on women facing dark and dangerous obstacles

Arthur Coburn Why did Arthur love this book?

I loved this book despite the butterflies in my gut as I read of Tracy Crosswhite’s pain about her sister, Sarah, missing for years. I shared Tracy’s pain about the devastating murder trial.

I rooted for Tracy’s hard work to become a homicide detective so she could track down killers. And I squirmed when authorities found Sarah’s body in the Northern Cascades in Washington State and when Tracy learned dark secrets about her past.

By Robert Dugoni,

Why should I read it?

3 authors picked My Sister's Grave as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The first book in the series that has garnered millions of readers across the globe, from New York Times bestselling author Robert Dugoni.

Tracy Crosswhite has spent twenty years questioning the facts surrounding her sister Sarah's disappearance and the murder trial that followed. She doesn't believe that Edmund House-a convicted rapist and the man condemned for Sarah's murder-is the guilty party. Motivated by the opportunity to obtain real justice, Tracy became a homicide detective with the Seattle PD and dedicated her life to tracking down killers.

When Sarah's remains are finally discovered near their hometown in the northern Cascade mountains…


Book cover of Girls Burn Brighter

Laurie Frankel Author Of One Two Three

From my list on how sisters are great but also a pain in your ass.

Why am I passionate about this?

I like books about big families, especially unusual ones, but I have only one sister and only one child, so when I set out to write about these families, I read about them first. We place so much importance on how kids are raised, what kind of childhood and home life and family they have growing up, what gifts and what challenges they’re bestowed by genetics, history, identity, society, circumstance. Siblings usually share all or at least most of these markers and yet turn into often wildly different adults. It’s also true that all those fine sibling balances – love/hate, adored/annoyed, admired/appalled, alike/different – are great fun to read and write.

Laurie's book list on how sisters are great but also a pain in your ass

Laurie Frankel Why did Laurie love this book?

The sisters in Girls Burn Brighter aren’t related by blood or family or tradition or history. They are sisters in ways much more profound and important and life-changing and path-determining than that. This beautiful novel traverses continents and cultures to prove blood ties and family ties have nothing on sister ties.

By Shobha Rao,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Girls Burn Brighter as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

'A treat for Ferrante fans, exploring the bonds of friendship and how female ambition beats against the strictures of poverty and patriarchal societies'
Huffington Post

An electrifying debut novel - the story of the unbreakable bond between two girls driven apart, and their journeys across continents to find each other again.

Poornima and Savitha, born in poverty, have known little kindness in their lives until they meet as teenagers. When an act of devastating cruelty drives Savitha away, Poornima leaves behind everything she has ever known to find her friend.

Alternating between the girls' perspectives as they face apparently insurmountable…


Book cover of Native Seattle: Histories from the Crossing-Over Place

Patricia E. Rubertone Author Of Native Providence: Memory, Community, and Survivance in the Northeast

From my list on Indigenous survivance, place, and memory.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am an anthropological archaeologist specializing in the Indigenous cultures of the Northeastern United States. My research intersects archaeology, anthropology, history, and Native American and Indigenous Studies to explore settler colonialism, landscape and memory, and Indigenous survivance. I’ve always been interested in cities, maybe because I’m city-born and raised and have spent my academic career at an Ivy League university in Providence. I read these books because I’m fascinated by place-based stories of Indigenous survivance in cities and elsewhere that challenge omissions and misconceptions about their colonial experiences in the popular historical imagination. I hope you enjoy these books as much as I have!

Patricia's book list on Indigenous survivance, place, and memory

Patricia E. Rubertone Why did Patricia love this book?

This book is about the enduring presence of Native people in Seattle, a city located on the traditional land of the Duwamish Tribe that promotes its Indigenous heritage but marginalizes its living Indigenous residents.

Thrush challenges the myth that Indigenous people are not part of the history of modern U.S. cities and, if present at all, are merely ghostly remnants of the pre-colonial past. His is a smart, insightful, and engaging place-based, collaborative history of Seattle filled with powerful images of streetscapes that made me think about settler-colonial cities in a new light.

By Coll Thrush,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Native Seattle as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This updated edition of Native Seattle brings the indigenous story to the present day and puts the movement of recognizing Seattle's Native past into a broader context. Native Seattle focuses on the experiences of local indigenous communities on whose land Seattle grew, accounts of Native migrants to the city and the development of a multi-tribal urban community, as well as the role Native Americans have played in the narrative of Seattle.


Book cover of The Seattle General Strike

Adam J. Hodges Author Of World War I and Urban Order: The Local Class Politics of National Mobilization

From my list on the U.S. Red Scare of the Russian Revolution and WWI era.

Why am I passionate about this?

I'm a professor of modern U.S. history and have spent my career researching this list's fascinating era. This moment began our modern political history. The first Red Scare in the United States, erupting in the wake of World War I and the Russian Revolution, was a conflict over the definition and limits of radicalism in a modern democracy and the limits of its repression. It was also tied to other seismic questions of the era that remain relevant, including how far the fights of women and Blacks for opportunities and rights that other Americans took for granted could succeed, whether to end mass immigration, the meaning of ‘Americanism,’ the extent of civil liberties, the limits of capitalism, and the role of social movements in the republic.

Adam's book list on the U.S. Red Scare of the Russian Revolution and WWI era

Adam J. Hodges Why did Adam love this book?

The Seattle General Strike was the local event that escalated a national Red Scare at the beginning of 1919 and caused a wave of panic that the Russian Revolution was coming home. Friedheim is great at explaining how this extraordinary event occurred, sketching the key factions in the city, and narrating the drama of the big moments. This classic account of strikers running a city until the troops were called in, first published in 1964, is back in print in a great new edition with photos.

By Robert L. Friedheim,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Seattle General Strike as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

"We are undertaking the most tremendous move ever made by LABOR in this country, a move which will lead-NO ONE KNOWS WHERE!" With these words echoing throughout the city, on February 6, 1919, 65,000 Seattle workers began one of the most important general strikes in US history. For six tense yet nonviolent days, the Central Labor Council negotiated with federal and local authorities on behalf of the shipyard workers whose grievances initiated the citywide walkout. Meanwhile, strikers organized to provide essential services such as delivering supplies to hospitals and markets, as well as feeding thousands at union-run dining facilities.

Robert…


Book cover of Where'd You Go, Bernadette

Nova García Author Of Not That Kind of Call Girl

From my list on books that make you belly laugh.

Why am I passionate about this?

I want to tackle the profound challenges some new mothers face. Who’s read a funny book about postpartum depression? Probably no one! My novel fills the gap. I suffered from postpartum in silence, afraid of the stigma it might bring. I hope this relatable story normalizes postpartum, sparks conversations, and drives change. I also wanted to write something with a Latina in the starring role. People of Latino descent suffer from many hurtful and inaccurate stereotypes. Increasing positively portrayed Latinos in fiction is personal for me. I’m exceedingly proud of my Latino roots and hope it comes through in my writing.

Nova's book list on books that make you belly laugh

Nova García Why did Nova love this book?

Bernadette can be difficult to like, but that's partly why I love her character. She's unapologetically authentic with sharp edges and a serious dislike of Seattle. Rather than grimace at her put-downs of my hometown, I laughed because she included inside jokes only Seattlites would understand, and there was a granule of truth in all of it.

I'm intensely interested in the challenges and rewards of motherhood. Portraying it as something emotionally draining and frustrating, utterly consuming and ultimately wonderful, Maria Semple captured what many of us experience using Bernadette as her medium.

By Maria Semple,

Why should I read it?

14 authors picked Where'd You Go, Bernadette as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A misanthropic matriarch leaves her eccentric family in crisis when she mysteriously disappears in this "whip-smart and divinely funny" novel that inspired the movie starring Cate Blanchett (New York Times).

Bernadette Fox is notorious. To her Microsoft-guru husband, she's a fearlessly opinionated partner; to fellow private-school mothers in Seattle, she's a disgrace; to design mavens, she's a revolutionary architect; and to 15-year-old Bee, she is her best friend and, simply, Mom.

Then Bernadette vanishes. It all began when Bee aced her report card and claimed her promised reward: a family trip to Antarctica. But Bernadette's intensifying allergy to Seattle --…


Book cover of Greywalker

Sarah J. Sover Author Of Fairy Godmurder

From my list on dicks in urban fantasy (detectives, that is).

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m Sarah J. Sover, and I adore smashing genres together, especially when there’s magic involved. My first book, Double-Crossing the Bridge, is a comedic fantasy about drunk trolls pulling a suicidal heist, and my new release, Fairy Godmurder is like Jessica Jones with sparkle. The novels are wildly different from each other, but they both exist in the crime-fantasy sphere, where I can delve deep into character motivations, explore wrongs in the world through a fantastical lens, and play with well-loved tropes, inverting and subverting in unexpected ways. I love that this is a growing genre, and I hope I get an influx of suggestions added to my own TBR tower because of this list!

Sarah's book list on dicks in urban fantasy (detectives, that is)

Sarah J. Sover Why did Sarah love this book?

After a near-death experience, PI Harper Blaine gains the ability to navigate the occult world of magic. But the realm between our world and the next is filled with monsters. Some are malicious, but some are looking to hire. The concept of the Grey is fascinating and slightly terrifying to me. Harper deserves to be on this list because only a true badass could survive her client list.

By Kat Richardson,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Greywalker as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Meet Harper Blaine. She also sees dead people...Harper Blaine is a small-time private investigator trying to earn a living when a low-life savagely assaults her, leaving her for dead. For two minutes, to be precise. When Harper comes to in the hospital, she begins to feel a bit ...strange. She sees things that can only be described as weird-shapes emerging from a foggy grey mist, snarling teeth, creatures roaring. But Harper's not crazy. Her "death" has made her a Greywalker - able to move between our world and the mysterious, cross-over zone where things that go bump in the night…


Book cover of Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl
Book cover of The Poet X
Book cover of Eliza and Her Monsters

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