Books like The Perks of Being a Wallflower
What should you read after Stephen Chbosky’s novel? It depends on what you loved most about it.
- Stephen Chbosky
- 1999
- Coming-of-age fiction
What did you love about it?
Choosing one reorders everything below.
Best books to read after The Perks of Being a Wallflower
Ranked overall. Pick what you loved above to re-rank them.
Best overall matchThe Catcher in the Rye
J.D. Salinger
Charlie's obvious ancestor: a teenage boy talking straight at you, circling a grief he won't name, funny right up to the point where he clearly isn't.
- A narrator hiding it from himself
- Letters to a stranger
- Trauma surfacing late
- Holden is far more caustic
Great matchA Separate Peace
John Knowles
Boarding-school friendship between a watcher and a golden boy, narrated years later by someone still auditing his own guilt. The wallflower's position, in wartime.
- A narrator hiding it from himself
- Misfit friends who adopt you
- Trauma surfacing late
- Formal, mid-century prose
Great matchThe Fault in Our Stars
John Green
Green's teenagers talk the way Charlie's friends do — too well, on purpose — and the book earns it by refusing to let anyone be brave in a tidy way.
- Loving someone who can't love you back
- The feeling-infinite moments
- Misfit friends who adopt you
- Terminal illness throughout
Best for the buried traumaSpeak
Laurie Halse Anderson
Melinda stops talking after a party she can't describe, and the book waits, patiently, until she can. The closest anyone comes to what Perks is actually about.
- Trauma surfacing late
- A narrator hiding it from himself
- A teacher who notices
- Sexual assault is central
Best for the first-love acheEleanor & Park
Rainbow Rowell
Two misfits on a school bus in 1986, trading comics and mixtapes, both far more frightened of home than of each other. Perks with the music turned up.
- Mixtapes and first songs
- Loving someone who can't love you back
- The feeling-infinite moments
- Romance rather than friend group
Great matchLooking for Alaska
John Green
A quiet boy arrives somewhere new, gets adopted by louder people, and spends the second half working out what he actually saw. The structure does the grieving for him.
- Misfit friends who adopt you
- Loving someone who can't love you back
- A narrator hiding it from himself
- Boarding school, not suburbia
Great matchIt's Kind of a Funny Story
Ned Vizzini
Craig checks himself into a psychiatric ward for five days and finds, as Charlie does, that the people who help most are the ones not pretending to be fine.
- Misfit friends who adopt you
- A narrator hiding it from himself
- A teacher who notices
- Hospital setting, not high school
Worth a look — with a warningDear Evan Hansen
Steven Levenson
An anxious boy writes letters to himself, one gets loose, and a lie makes him briefly beloved. The Charlie premise inverted: what if being seen was the problem.
- Letters to a stranger
- A narrator hiding it from himself
- Misfit friends who adopt you
- A musical's book, not a novel
Worth a look — with a warningThirteen Reasons Why
Jay Asher
Cassette tapes instead of letters, and a narrator listening to a girl he failed. It shares Perks's confessional format and almost none of its tenderness.
- Letters to a stranger
- Trauma surfacing late
- A narrator hiding it from himself
- Suicide depicted and rationalised
Great matchAll the Bright Places
Jennifer Niven
Two kids meet at the top of a bell tower and spend the rest of the book driving around Indiana looking at small wonders. The infinite-feeling moments, deliberately collected.
- The feeling-infinite moments
- Loving someone who can't love you back
- Trauma surfacing late
- Ends where you fear it will
Best if you want a lighter tonePaper Towns
John Green
The same worship of an unknowable girl, but Green lets the joke land: Quentin's road trip is mostly about discovering he invented the person he was chasing.
- Loving someone who can't love you back
- Misfit friends who adopt you
- The feeling-infinite moments
- Comic register, low stakes
Great matchThe Spectacular Now
Tim Tharp
Sutter is the boy at every party Charlie watched from the edge, and the book stays with him long enough to show what the charm is doing for him.
- A narrator hiding it from himself
- The feeling-infinite moments
- Loving someone who can't love you back
- Teenage alcoholism throughout
What should you read after The Perks of Being a Wallflower?
The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky works on several levels at once, and which book you should read next depends on which of those levels got you. For most readers the closest match is The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger — charlie's obvious ancestor: a teenage boy talking straight at you, circling a grief he won't name, funny right up to the point where he clearly isn't.
If what stayed with you was a narrator hiding it from himself, read A Separate Peace by John Knowles instead: boarding-school friendship between a watcher and a golden boy, narrated years later by someone still auditing his own guilt. The wallflower's position, in wartime. The Fault in Our Stars by John Green is the other strong option — green's teenagers talk the way Charlie's friends do — too well, on purpose — and the book earns it by refusing to let anyone be brave in a tidy way.
Common questions
- What should you read after The Perks of Being a Wallflower?
- The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, A Separate Peace by John Knowles, The Fault in Our Stars by John Green are the closest matches. Which fits best depends on what you loved about The Perks of Being a Wallflower: letters to a stranger, a narrator hiding it from himself, misfit friends who adopt you, loving someone who can't love you back.
- What is the best book like The Perks of Being a Wallflower?
- The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger is the strongest overall match. Charlie's obvious ancestor: a teenage boy talking straight at you, circling a grief he won't name, funny right up to the point where he clearly isn't.
- What are books similar to The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky?
- The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, A Separate Peace by John Knowles, The Fault in Our Stars by John Green, Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson, Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell, Looking for Alaska by John Green, It's Kind of a Funny Story by Ned Vizzini, Dear Evan Hansen by Steven Levenson, Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher, All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven, Paper Towns by John Green, The Spectacular Now by Tim Tharp. Each one matches a different part of The Perks of Being a Wallflower rather than just its genre.
- Is The Catcher in the Rye worth reading after The Perks of Being a Wallflower?
- Yes — readers who loved The Perks of Being a Wallflower tend to land well with it: a voice you hear immediately; grief kept just offstage; adolescent alienation, first person. One thing to know going in: holden is far more caustic.
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