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🧲 Books like this

Something Real

Heather Demetrios · back to the book

What’s in it

Tap a tag: ❤ = this matters to me · tap again ✕ = don’t care · again to reset. The list below updates each time.

24 books with the same feel

Include books by the same author
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My Life Next Door

Huntley Fitzpatrick · 432 pages

When Samantha, the seventeen-year-old daugher of a wealthy, perfectionistic, Republican state senator, falls in love with the boy next door, whose family is large, boisterous, and just making ends meet, she discovers a different way to live, but when her mother is involved in a hit-and-run accident Sam must make some difficult choices.

Large FamilyToxic Family DynamicsSelf-DiscoveryTeen Protagonist
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Burned

Ellen Hopkins · 544 pages

NY Times bestseller, is the story of a young woman, struggling to find her place in the world in the face of abuse by the person she most adores: her father. She questions her family, her faith, and her ability to love and be loved. Suspended from school, she is sent to rural Nevada to live with an aunt whom she barely knows. There she finds love, acceptance and new knowledge about the things t

Large FamilyToxic Family DynamicsSelf-DiscoveryTeen Protagonist
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Devoted

Jennifer Mathieu · 336 pages

Large FamilyToxic Family DynamicsSelf-DiscoveryTeen Protagonist
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Reality Boy

A.S. King · 353 pages

"An emotionally damaged seventeen-year-old boy in Pennsylvania who was once an infamous reality television show star, meets a girl from another dysfunctional family, and she helps him out of his angry shell"-- An emotionally damaged 17-year-old boy in Pennsylvania who was once an infamous reality television show star meets a girl from another dysfunctional family, and she helps him out of his ang

Reality TVToxic Family DynamicsSelf-DiscoveryYoung Adult
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Dreamland

Sarah Dessen · 256 pages

Rogerson Biscoe, with his green eyes and dark curly hair, is absolutely seductive. Before long, sixteen-year-old Caitlin finds herself under his spell. And when he starts to abuse her, she finds she's in too deep to get herself out...

Toxic Family DynamicsYoung AdultTeen ProtagonistSelf-Discovery
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Without Merit

Colleen Hoover · 384 pages

*Not every mistake deserves a consequence. Sometimes the only thing it deserves is forgiveness.* The Voss family is anything but normal. They live in a repurposed church, newly baptized Dollar Voss. The once cancer-stricken mother lives in the basement, the father is married to the mother’s former nurse, the little half-brother isn’t allowed to do or eat anything fun, and the eldest siblings ar

Toxic Family DynamicsSelf-DiscoveryTeen ProtagonistYoung Adult
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Blind

Rachel DeWoskin · 405 pages

After a horrific accident leaves her blind, fifteen-year-old Emma, one of seven children, eagerly starts high school as a sophomore, and finds that nearly everything has changed--sometimes for the better. After a horrific accident leaves her blind, fifteen-year-old Emma eagerly starts high school as a sophomore and finds that nearly everything has changed, sometimes for the better. The plot conta

Large FamilySelf-DiscoveryTeen ProtagonistYoung Adult
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The DUFF: Designated Ugly Fat Friend

Kody Keplinger · 352 pages

This is about a girl named Bianca and she just learnt that she is the DUFF of her friend group.

Toxic Family DynamicsTeen ProtagonistYoung AdultSelf-Discovery
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Story of a Girl

Sara Zarr · 224 pages

When she is caught in the backseat of a car with her older brother's best friend - Deanna Lambert's teenage life is changed forever. Struggling to overcome the lasting repercussions and the stifling role of "school slut," she longs to escape a life defined by her past. With subtle grace, complicated wisdom and striking emotion, The Story of a Girl reminds us of our human capacity for resilience, e

Toxic Family DynamicsSelf-DiscoveryTeen ProtagonistYoung Adult
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Everything, Everything

Nicola Yoon · 320 pages

The story of a teenage girl who's literally allergic to the outside world. When a new family moves in next door, she begins a complicated romance that challenges everything she's ever known. The narrative unfolds via vignettes, diary entries, texts, charts, lists, illustrations, and more.

Self-DiscoveryToxic Family DynamicsTeen ProtagonistYoung Adult
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Reason to Breathe

Rebecca Donovan

Toxic Family DynamicsSelf-DiscoveryYoung AdultTeen Protagonist
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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

Large FamilyYoung AdultSelf-DiscoveryTeen Protagonist
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How Moon Fuentez Fell in Love with the Universe

Raquel Vasquez Gilliland · 432 pages

Toxic Family DynamicsSelf-DiscoveryTeen ProtagonistYoung Adult
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The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things

Carolyn Mackler · 288 pages

Feeling like she does not fit in with the other members of her family, who are all thin, brilliant, and good-looking, fifteen-year-old Virginia tries to deal with her self-image, her first physical relationship, and her disillusionment with some of the people closest to her.

Toxic Family DynamicsSelf-DiscoveryTeen ProtagonistYoung Adult
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North of Beautiful

Justina Chen

As he continued to stare, I wanted to point to my cheek and remind him, But you were the one who wanted this, remember? You're the one who asked-and I repeat-Why not fix your face? It's hard not to notice Terra Cooper. She's tall, blond, and has an enviable body. But with one turn of her cheek, all people notice is her unmistakably "flawed" face. Terra secretly plans to leave her stifling small

Toxic Family DynamicsTeen ProtagonistSelf-DiscoveryYoung Adult
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How I Got Skinny, Famous, and Fell Madly in Love

Ken Baker · 269 pages

Emery Jackson signs up for a reality TV weight loss show and discovers many truths.

Reality TVSelf-DiscoveryYoung AdultTeen Protagonist
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Life by Committee

Corey Ann Haydu · 298 pages

Tabitha might be the only girl in the history of the world who actually gets less popular when she gets hot. But her so-called friends say she's changed, and they've dropped her flat. Now Tab has no one to tell about the best and worst thing that has ever happened to her: Joe, who spills his most intimate secrets to her in their nightly online chats. Joe, whose touch is so electric, it makes Tab w

Self-DiscoveryTeen ProtagonistYoung AdultContemporary Fiction
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Six Crimson Cranes

Elizabeth Lim · 454 pages

Large FamilyToxic Family DynamicsTeen ProtagonistYoung Adult
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Luna

Julie Anne Peters · 248 pages

Regan's brother Liam can't stand the person he is during the day. Like the moon from whom Liam has chosen his female namesake, his true self, Luna, only reveals herself at night. In the secrecy of his basement bedroom Liam transforms himself into the beautiful girl he longs to be, with help from his sister's clothes and makeup. Now, everything is about to change-Luna is preparing to emerge from he

Toxic Family DynamicsTeen ProtagonistSelf-DiscoveryYoung Adult
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The Vigilante Poets of Selwyn Academy

Kate Hattemer · 329 pages

"When a sleazy reality television show takes over Ethan's arts academy, he and his friends concoct an artsy plan to take it down"--

Reality TVTeen ProtagonistYoung AdultContemporary Fiction
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The Thirteenth Child

Erin A. Craig · 498 pages

Large FamilyToxic Family DynamicsYoung AdultFirst Person Narrator
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Speak

Laurie Halse Anderson · 197 pages

"Speak up for yourself--we want to know what you have to say." From the first moment of her freshman year at Merryweather High, Melinda knows this is a big fat lie, part of the nonsense of high school. She is friendless, outcast, because she busted an end-of-summer party by calling the cops, so now nobody will talk to her, let alone listen to her. As time passes, she becomes increasingly isolated

Toxic Family DynamicsYoung AdultSelf-DiscoveryTeen Protagonist
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The Sweet, Terrible, Glorious Year I Truly, Completely Lost It

Lisa Shanahan · 304 pages

IN MY FAMILY, when anyone rides the wave of their emotions, we say they're chucking a birkett. When the emotion drives out all common sense, we say they're chucking a big one. The telltale signs are: flaming cheeks, shortness of breath, bulging eyes, and a prolonged illogical outburst.Gemma Stone is convinced that it's always unseemly to chuck a birkett and that it's actually insane to chuck one i

Large FamilyTeen ProtagonistYoung AdultContemporary Fiction
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Life in a Fishbowl

Len Vlahos · 332 pages

Fifteen-year-old Jackie is determined to reclaim her family's privacy and dignity by ending a reality television program about her father's terminal brain tumor.

Reality TVTeen ProtagonistYoung AdultContemporary Fiction
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