Friendship is tricky, but it’s also forgiving, and it looks different for every relationship. Making friends, keeping friends, growing with and apart from friends feels like what we spend most of our lives doing. The reality is, the relationships we create with the people around us are vital to our very existence. The people we meet with whom we build connections based on similar experiences and interests foster our personal communities and grow closer to, impacting the health of our lives. Friendships that carry strength, love, and care are snapshots of the life we’ve spent creating. And it’s those snapshots that you’ll look back on fondly in moments that are bittersweet, memorable, and ultimately worth it.
Here are some book recommendations that explore friendship in its many facets.
Chlorine Sky by Mahogany L. Browne
From Goodreads
A novel-in-verse about a young girl coming-of-age and stepping out of the shadow of her former best friend.
She looks me hard in my eyes
& my knees lock into tree trunks
My eyes don’t dance like my heartbeat racing
They stare straight back like hot daggers.
I remember things will never be the same.
I remember things.
Early Departures by Justin A. Reynolds
From Goodreads
Jamal’s best friend, Q, doesn’t know he’s about to die…again.
He also doesn’t know that Jamal tried to save his life, rescuing him from drowning, only to watch Q die later in the hospital. Even more complicated, Jamal and Q haven’t been best friends in two years–not since Jamal’s parents died in a car accident, leaving him and his sister to carry on without them. Grief swallowed Jamal whole, and he blamed Q for causing the accident.
But what if Jamal could have a second chance? An impossible chance that would grant him the opportunity to say goodbye to his best friend? A new health-care technology allows Q to be reanimated–brought back to life like the old Q again. But there’s a catch. Q will only reanimate for a short time before he dies…forever.
Jamal is determined to make things right with Q, but grief is hard to shake. And he can’t tell Q why he’s suddenly trying to be friends with him again. Because Q has no idea that he died, and Q’s mom is not about to let anyone ruin the miracle by telling him. How can Jamal fix his friendship with Q if he can’t let him know the truth?
When You Were Everything by Ashley Woodfolk
From Goodreads
It’s been twenty-seven days since Cleo and Layla’s friendship imploded.
Nearly a month since Cleo realized they’ll never be besties again.
Now, Cleo wants to erase every memory, good or bad, that tethers her to her ex-best friend. But pretending Layla doesn’t exist isn’t as easy as Cleo hoped, especially after she’s assigned to be Layla’s tutor. Despite budding new friendships with other classmates–and a raging crush on a gorgeous boy named Dom–Cleo’s turbulent past with Layla comes back to haunt them both.
Chronically Dolores by Maya Van Wagenen
From Goodreads
Dolores Mendoza is not thriving. She was recently diagnosed with a chronic bladder condition called interstitial cystitis. The painful disease isn’t life-threatening, but it is threatening to ruin her life.
Just when things seem hopeless, Dolores meets someone poised to change her fate. Terpsichore Berkenboch-Jones is glamorous, autistic, and homeschooled against her will by her overprotective mother. After a rocky start, the girls form a tentative partnership. Beautiful, talented Terpsichore will help Dolores win back her ex-best friend, Shae. And Dolores will convince Terpsichore’s mom that her daughter has the social skills to survive public school. It seems like a foolproof plan, but Dolores isn’t always a reliable narrator, and her choices may put her in danger of committing an unforgivable betrayal.
Monday’s Not Coming by Tiffany D. Jackson
From Goodreads
Monday, Charles is missing, and only Claudia seems to notice. Claudia and Monday have always been inseparable–more sisters than friends. So when Monday doesn’t turn up for the first day of school, Claudia’s worried. When she doesn’t show for the second day or second week, Claudia knows that something is wrong. Monday wouldn’t just leave her to endure tests and bullies alone. Not after last year’s rumors and not with her grades on the line. Now Claudia needs her best–and only–friend more than ever. But Monday’s mother refuses to give Claudia a straight answer, and Monday’s sister April is even less help.
As Claudia digs deeper into her friend’s disappearance, she discovers that no one seems to remember the last time they saw Monday. How can a teenage girl just vanish without anyone noticing that she’s gone?
Does My Body Offend You? by Mayra Cuevas, Marie Marquardt
From Goodreads
Malena Rosario is starting to believe that catastrophes come in threes. First, Hurricane Maria destroyed her home, taking her unbreakable spirit with it. Second, she and her mother are now stuck in Florida, which is nothing like her beloved Puerto Rico. And third, when she goes to school braless after a bad sunburn and is humiliated by the school administration into covering up, she feels like she has no choice but to comply.
Ruby McAllister has a reputation as her school’s outspoken feminist rebel. But back in Seattle, she lived under her sister’s shadow. Now her sister is teaching underprivileged communities, and she’s in a Florida high school, unsure of what to do with her future, or if she’s even capable of making a difference in the world. So when Ruby notices the new girl is being forced to cover up her chest, she is not willing to keep quiet about it.
Neither Malena nor Ruby expected to be the leaders of the school’s dress code rebellion. But the girls will have to face their own insecurities, biases, and privileges, and the ups and downs in their newfound friendship, if they want to stand up for their ideals and –ultimately–for themselves.
Darius the Great Is Not Okay by Adib Khorram
From Goodreads
Darius doesn’t think he’ll ever be enough, in America or in Iran.
Darius Kellner speaks better Klingon than Farsi, and he knows more about Hobbit social cues than Persian ones. He’s about to take his first-ever trip to Iran, and it’s pretty overwhelming–especially when he’s also dealing with clinical depression, a disapproving dad, and a chronically anemic social life. In Iran, he gets to know his ailing but still formidable grandfather, his loving grandmother, and the rest of his mom’s family for the first time. And he meets Sohrab, the boy next door who changes everything.
Sohrab makes sure people speak English so Darius can understand what’s going on. He gets Darius an Iranian National Football Team jersey that makes him feel like a True Persian for the first time. And he understands that sometimes, best friends don’t have to talk. Darius has never had a true friend before, but now he’s spending his days with Sohrab playing soccer, eating rosewater ice cream, and sitting together for hours in their special place, a rooftop overlooking the Yazdi skyline.
Sohrab calls him Darioush–the original Persian version of his name–and Darius has never felt more like himself than he does now that he’s Darioush to Sohrab. When it’s time to go home to America, he’ll have to find a way to be Darioush on his own.
Kings of B’more by R. Eric Thomas
From Goodreads
With junior year starting in the fall, Harrison feels like he’s on the precipice of, well, everything. Standardized testing, college, and the terrifying unknowns and looming pressures of adulthood after that–it’s like the future wants to eat him alive. Which is why Harrison is grateful that he and his best friend Linus will face these things together. But at the end of a shift at their summer job, Linus invites Harrison to their special spot overlooking the city to deliver devastating news; he’s moving out of state at the end of the week.
To keep from completely losing it–and partially inspired by a cheesy movie-night pick by his Dad–Harrison plans a send-off a la Ferris Bueller’s Day Off that’s worthy of his favorite person. If they won’t be having all the life-expanding experiences they thought they would, Harrison will squeeze them all into their last day. They end up on a mini road trip, their first Pride, and a rooftop dance party, all while keeping their respective parents, who track them on a family location app, off their trail. Harrison and Linus make a pact to do all the things–big and small–they’ve been too scared to do. But nothing feels scarier than saying goodbye to someone you love.
