# What is the greatest novel written by a teenager?

> Every book here was finished before its author could legally rent a car. A few became school reading; others stayed cult objects.

*By YPB Team · Published September 22, 2026 · https://youpick.best/ranking/what-is-the-greatest-novel-written-by-a-teenager*

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## Current results (no votes yet)

1. **Frankenstein** — score 1000/1000
   Mary Shelley began it at 18 during the summer of 1816 and finished it at 19; it was published in 1818.
2. **In the Forests of the Night** — score 1000/1000
   Amelia Atwater-Rhodes' vampire novel, written at 13 and published in 1999.
3. **Eragon** — score 709/1000
   Christopher Paolini's dragon-rider fantasy, begun at 15 and self-published before he turned 20.
4. **The Devil in the Flesh** — score 600/1000
   Raymond Radiguet's 1923 novel of a wartime affair, written in his teens.
5. **The Kissing Booth** — score 600/1000
   Beth Reekles' teen romance, written at 15 on Wattpad and later a Netflix film.
6. **This Can't Be Happening at Macdonald Hall!** — score 600/1000
   Gordon Korman's boarding-school comedy, written at 12 as a class assignment.
7. **The Icarus Girl** — score 466/1000
   Helen Oyeyemi's debut about a Nigerian-English girl and her double, written at 18.
8. **The Outsiders** — score 0/1000
   S.E. Hinton's 1967 novel of Greasers and Socs in Tulsa, written while she was in high school.
9. **Bonjour Tristesse** — score 0/1000
   Françoise Sagan's 1954 novel of a Riviera summer, written when she was 18.
10. **Twelve** — score 0/1000
   Nick McDonell's 2002 novel of Manhattan prep-school excess, written at 17.
11. **The Young Visiters** — score 0/1000
   Daisy Ashford's comic society novel, written at nine and published in 1919.

Tags: books, classics, fiction, authors