Books like The Selection
What should you read after Kiera Cass’s novel? It depends on what you loved most about it.
- Kiera Cass
- 2012
- Young adult dystopian romance
What did you love about it?
Choosing one reorders everything below.
Best books to read after The Selection
Ranked overall. Pick what you loved above to re-rank them.
Best overall matchRed Queen
Victoria Aveyard
A servant girl dropped into a palace of silver-blooded royals, engaged to a prince and lying to everyone in the building. The Selection's setup with sharper teeth.
- Caste numbers that rule your life
- A competition for a prince
- A rebellion at the gates
- Superpowers and battle scenes
Great matchThe Hunger Games
Suzanne Collins
The competition-on-camera premise Cass borrowed and softened. The same televised spectacle and the same boy back home, with the stakes turned up to lethal.
- The boy back home
- A competition for a prince
- Caste numbers that rule your life
- Children killing children
Great matchDivergent
Veronica Roth
A society sorted into fixed categories, a girl who does not fit hers, and an instructor she should not be looking at. Different furniture, identical pleasures.
- Caste numbers that rule your life
- A girl who doesn't want to win
- Comfort reading with stakes
- Heavy on training and violence
Best for the boy back homeMatched
Ally Condie
The state picks your husband and Cassia wants the other one. It is the love triangle from The Selection with the competition removed and the control turned up.
- The boy back home
- Caste numbers that rule your life
- A competition for a prince
- Gentler pace, less spectacle
Worth a look — with a warningThe Jewel
Amy Ewing
Girls auctioned into royal households for their bodies rather than their charm: the same gowns-and-hierarchy setting with a genuinely unpleasant premise underneath.
- Caste numbers that rule your life
- Palace dresses and etiquette
- A girl who doesn't want to win
- The surrogacy plot is grim
Great matchThe Elite
Kiera Cass
The next instalment: the field narrows, Aspen is still around, and America still cannot decide. If you closed book one wanting more, this is literally that.
- A competition for a prince
- The boy back home
- A girl who doesn't want to win
- America's dithering frustrates some readers
Great matchThe One
Kiera Cass
The finale, where the choosing finally happens and the rebellion stops being background noise. Read it for resolution rather than for any new idea.
- A competition for a prince
- A rebellion at the gates
- Comfort reading with stakes
- Third book; read in order
Great matchThe Heir
Kiera Cass
The same Selection run again a generation later, this time by a princess picking from thirty-five boys. A neat inversion if you want the format, not the couple.
- A competition for a prince
- Palace dresses and etiquette
- A girl who doesn't want to win
- Eadlyn is hard to like at first
Great matchThe Crown
Kiera Cass
The closing book of Eadlyn's Selection, in which the princess finally chooses. Slight and fast, and only worth it once you are invested in the second pair.
- A competition for a prince
- Comfort reading with stakes
- Palace dresses and etiquette
- Very short for the price
Great matchLegend
Marie Lu
Two teenagers at opposite ends of a rigged social ladder, told in alternating voices. The class anger underneath The Selection, given a plot that actually runs.
- Caste numbers that rule your life
- A rebellion at the gates
- The boy back home
- Chase thriller more than romance
Worth a look — with a warningThe Giver
Lois Lowry
The grandparent of every assigned-role dystopia, this one included. Short, strange, and much more interested in ideas than in whether the prince likes you.
- Caste numbers that rule your life
- A girl who doesn't want to win
- No romance to speak of
Best for forbidden feelingDelirium
Lauren Oliver
Love is classified as a disease here and the cure is compulsory, which turns every glance into the sort of high-stakes secret The Selection only occasionally manages.
- The boy back home
- A rebellion at the gates
- Comfort reading with stakes
- Sadder ending than expected
Worth a look — with a warningShatter Me
Tahereh Mafi
A girl weaponised by the regime that imprisoned her, narrated in crossed-out sentences. The dystopian-romance engine, running a great deal hotter.
- A girl who doesn't want to win
- Comfort reading with stakes
- Caste numbers that rule your life
- Stylised prose divides readers
What should you read after The Selection?
The Selection by Kiera Cass 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 Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard — a servant girl dropped into a palace of silver-blooded royals, engaged to a prince and lying to everyone in the building. The Selection's setup with sharper teeth.
If what stayed with you was the boy back home, read The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins instead: the competition-on-camera premise Cass borrowed and softened. The same televised spectacle and the same boy back home, with the stakes turned up to lethal. Divergent by Veronica Roth is the other strong option — a society sorted into fixed categories, a girl who does not fit hers, and an instructor she should not be looking at. Different furniture, identical pleasures.
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