Fiction books featuring heroines

Here’s a list of some of our favourite stories with inspiring heroines for older girls and young teens.

  • Matilda

    by Roald Dahl, illustrated by Quentin Blake 

    2016 5 to 14 years 

    • Adventure
    • Classics
    • Fantasy
    • Funny

    This modern fairy-tale with a brilliantly inspiring young heroine is one of Roald Dahl’s best loved stories.

  • The Story of Tracy Beaker

    by Jacqueline Wilson, illustrated by Nick Sharratt 

    2006 5 to 14 years 

    • Classics
    • Diaries and journals

    Tracy lives in a children’s home but constantly hopes that her absent, glamorous Mum will come and take her away.

  • Howl’s Moving Castle

    by Diana Wynne Jones 

    2009 9 to 14 years 

    • Adventure
    • Classics
    • Fantasy

    Sophie Hatter is cursed with an old body by the Witch of the Waste and the spell can only be broken by the dreaded Wizard Howl who lives in his moving castle and likes to eat the souls of young girls.

  • Twelve Minutes to Midnight

    by Christopher Edge 

    2012 9 to 14 years 

    • Adventure
    • Historical

    Every night at precisely 12 minutes to midnight, the inmates of Bedlam, London’s notorious madhouse, all begin feverishly writing – incoherent ramblings that Penelope quickly realises are in fact terrifying visions of the new century to come.

  • The Hunger Games

    by Suzanne Collins 

    2015 11 to 14 years 

    • Adventure
    • Classics
    • Coming-of-age
    • Fantasy
    • Love and romance
    • Science fiction
    • Thriller
    • Dystopia

    Welcome to Panem: its Capitol repressively rules twelve satellite Districts, enslaving the populations as workers and controlling them through hunger.

  • Am I Normal Yet?

    by Holly Bourne 

    2015 11 to 14 years 

    • Coming-of-age

    This is a powerful and engrossing read that successfully informs, shocks, reassures and entertains in equal measures.