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🧲 Books like this

Freak Show

James St. James · back to the book

What’s in it

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24 books with the same feel

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Winger

Andrew Smith

Two years younger than his classmates at a prestigious boarding school, fourteen-year-old Ryan Dean West grapples with living in the dorm for troublemakers, falling for his female best friend who thinks of him as just a kid, and playing wing on the Varsity rugby team with some of his frightening new dorm-mates.

BullyingIdentity FormationLGBTQ+ ProtagonistYoung Adult
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Geography Club

Brent Hartinger · 226 pages

Russel Middlebrook is convinced he's the only gay kid at Goodkind High School.Then his online gay chat buddy turns out to be none other than Kevin, the popular but closeted star of the school's baseball team. Soon Russel meets other gay students, too. There's his best friend Min, who reveals that she is bisexual, and her soccer-playing girlfriend Terese. Then there's Terese's politically active fr

BullyingIdentity FormationLGBTQ+ ProtagonistYoung Adult
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The Misfits

James Howe · 274 pages

Four students who do not fit in at their small-town middle school decide to create a third party for the student council elections to represent all students who have ever been called names.

BullyingIdentity FormationLGBTQ+ ProtagonistFirst Person Narrator
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Boy Meets Boy

David Levithan · 185 pages

This is the story of Paul, a sophomore at a high school like no other: The cheerleaders ride Harleys, the homecoming queen used to be a guy named Daryl (she now prefers Infinite Darlene and is also the star quarterback), and the gay-straight alliance was formed to help the straight kids learn how to dance. When Paul meets Noah, he thinks he’s found the one his heart is made for. Until he blows

Identity FormationBullyingLGBTQ+ ProtagonistYoung Adult
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Putting Makeup on the Fat Boy

Bil Wright · 219 pages

Sixteen-year-old Carlos Duarte is on the verge of realizing his dream of becoming a famous make-up artist, but first he must face his jealous boss at a Macy's cosmetics counter, his sister's abusive boyfriend, and his crush on a punk-rocker classmate.

Identity FormationBullyingLGBTQ+ ProtagonistYoung Adult
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Alex As Well

Alyssa Brugman · 224 pages

Raised as a boy, fourteen-year-old Alex, who has male and female sexual body parts, rejects the hormonal medications prescribed by his mother and decides to live as a girl.

Identity FormationBullyingLGBTQ+ ProtagonistYoung Adult
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The Other Boy

M.G. Hennessey · 234 pages

"Since twelve-year old Shane moved to a new town, he has been concealing the fact he was born a girl, but when one of his classmates learns he is a transgender, Shane must deal with the reactions of his entire community"--

Identity FormationBullyingLGBTQ+ ProtagonistFirst Person Narrator
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The Pants Project

Cat Clarke · 267 pages

Technically, Olivia is not a girl, even though he was born as a girl. He's transgender. Liv knows he was always meant to be a boy. But at Bankridge Middle School, the dress code means he can't wear pants. Only skirts. So Operation: Pants Project begins! To Liv, this isn't just a mission to change the policy. It's a mission to change his life. And that's a pretty big deal.

Identity FormationBullyingLGBTQ+ ProtagonistFirst Person Narrator
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Will Grayson, Will Grayson

John Green, David Levithan · 331 pages

One cold night, in a most unlikely corner of Chicago, two teens—both named Will Grayson—are about to cross paths. As their worlds collide and intertwine, the Will Graysons find their lives going in new and unexpected directions, building toward romantic turns-of-heart and the epic production of history’s most fabulous high school musical.Hilarious, poignant, and deeply insightful, John Green and D

Identity FormationLGBTQ+ ProtagonistFirst Person NarratorYoung Adult
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Noah Can't Even

Simon James Green · 386 pages

Identity FormationLGBTQ+ ProtagonistBullyingYoung Adult
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Parrotfish

Ellen Wittlinger · 304 pages

BullyingLGBTQ+ ProtagonistYoung AdultFirst Person Narrator
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Sleeping Freshmen Never Lie

David Lubar · 288 pages

While navigating his first year of high school and awaiting the birth of his new baby brother, Scott loses old friends and gains some unlikely new ones as he hones his skills as a writer.

Identity FormationBullyingYoung AdultFirst Person Narrator
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Beast

Brie Spangler · 330 pages

After falling off the roof, fifteen-year-old misfit Dylan must attend a therapy group for self-harmers where he meets Jamie, a beautiful and amazing person he does not know is transgender.

Identity FormationBullyingYoung AdultFirst Person Narrator
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I Was a Non-Blonde Cheerleader

Kieran Scott · 272 pages

nnisa Gobrowski has a problem - everyone at her new Florida high school is blonde. If Annisa's New Jersey attitude didn't make her stand out enough, her dark pixie cut sure does. Yet no lack of golden highlights is going to stop Annisa from making the best of Sand Dune High, especially once she checks out their competition-level cheerleading squad, and her uberhot, guitar-playing new neighbor Dani

Identity FormationBullyingYoung AdultFirst Person Narrator
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Hero

Perry Moore · 432 pages

Funny, exciting novel about a teenage boy growing up with two secrets: one, that he has superpowers - two, that he's gay. And he gets to save the world... Even though Thom Creed's a basketball star, his high school classmates keep their distance. They've picked up on something different about Thom. Plus, his father, Hal Creed, was one of the greatest and most beloved superheroes of his time until

BullyingLGBTQ+ ProtagonistYoung AdultFirst Person Narrator
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Smile

Raina Telgemeier · 213 pages

BullyingIdentity FormationFirst Person NarratorFunny
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Openly Straight

Bill Konigsberg · 328 pages

Rafe has been out since eighth grade, and he's fine with it, and so is everyone else. But sometimes he just wants to be a regular guy, not the gay guy. So when he transfers to an all-boys' boarding school in New England, he decides to become "openly straight" instead. The transformation works: Rafe revels in a new group of straight guy friends and the freedom of living without a label. But then he

Identity FormationLGBTQ+ ProtagonistYoung AdultFirst Person Narrator
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The Scar Boys

Len Vlahos · 256 pages

Written as a college admission essay, eighteen-year-old Harry Jones recounts a childhood defined by the hideous scars he hid behind, and how forming a band brought self-confidence, friendship, and his first kiss.

BullyingIdentity FormationYoung AdultFirst Person Narrator
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The Manifesto on How to be Interesting

Holly Bourne · 464 pages

BullyingIdentity FormationYoung AdultFirst Person Narrator
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Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda

Becky Albertalli · 336 pages

Sixteen-year-old and not-so-openly gay Simon Spier prefers to save his drama for the school musical. But when an email falls into the wrong hands, his secret is at risk of being thrust into the spotlight. Now Simon is actually being blackmailed: if he doesn’t play wingman for class clown Martin, his sexual identity will become everyone’s business. Worse, the privacy of Blue, the pen name of the bo

LGBTQ+ ProtagonistBullyingYoung AdultFirst Person Narrator
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Down to the Bone

Mayra Lazara Dole · 384 pages

Here's what it means to be a tortillera. It means you're a girl who loves girls. Which means you get kicked out of Catholic school faster than Mother Superior Sicko can say "immoral." Which means your wacko Mami finds out. Which means you're kicked to the curb with nowhere to go, and the love of your life is shipped off to Puerto Rico to marry a guy.But this is Miami, and if you have a bighearted

LGBTQ+ ProtagonistBullyingYoung AdultFirst Person Narrator
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The Art of Starving

Sam J. Miller · 386 pages

A bullied gay teen boy with an eating disorder believes he's developed super powers via starvation. Matt's stomach stabs and twists, pleading for a meal, but Matt won't give in. The hunger clears his mind, keeps him sharp-- and the less he eats the more he seems to have the ability to see things he shouldn't be able to see. Maybe even the authority to bend time and space. And Matt needs to be as

BullyingLGBTQ+ ProtagonistYoung AdultFirst Person Narrator
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Twisted

Laurie Halse Anderson · 272 pages

High school senior Tyler Miller used to be the kind of guy who faded into the background—average student, average looks, average dysfunctional family. But since he got busted for doing graffiti on the school, and spent the summer doing outdoor work to pay for it, he stands out like you wouldn't believe. His new physique attracts the attention of queen bee Bethany Milbury, who just so happens to be

Identity FormationBullyingYoung AdultFirst Person Narrator
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In One Person

John Irving · 448 pages

A New York Times bestselling novel of desire, secrecy, and sexual identity, In One Person is a story of unfulfilled love—tormented, funny, and affecting—and an impassioned embrace of our sexual differences. Billy, the bisexual narrator and main character of In One Person, tells the tragicomic story (lasting more than half a century) of his life as a "sexual suspect," a phrase first used by John Ir

Identity FormationLGBTQ+ ProtagonistFirst Person NarratorGender Identity

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