Books like Real Friends
Real Friends by Shannon Hale reads as empathetic, reflective. These 12 books share its genome — matched by how they actually read, not just their shelf label.
What Real Friends is like to read
A warm, honest graphic memoir about the churn of grade-school friendships and cliques, told with a young narrator's earnest vulnerability and the emotional immediacy comics bring to childhood memory. Best for: middle-grade readers (and nostalgic adults) navigating friendship drama, cliques, and finding their people.
El Deafo
Cece Bell · 2014
A warm, funny graphic memoir about growing up deaf, told with childlike honesty and a superhero's imagination.
Welcome to St. Hell
Lewis Hancox · 2022
A graphic memoir that revisits a trans teen's adolescence with humor and warmth, the adult Lewis in dialogue with his younger self.
Dragon Hoops
Gene Luen Yang · 2020
A graphic narrative following a high school basketball season as a lens for exploring identity, racial experience, and belonging through Yang's characteristic blend of humor and ea
Honor girl
Maggie Thrash · 2015
An intimate, aching account of a first same-sex crush unfolding over a single summer at an all-girls camp, told with teenage immediacy and emotional rawness.
Gender Queer
Maia Kobabe · 2019
An intimate, candid graphic memoir that moves in vignettes through the author's journey to understanding eir nonbinary and asexual identity.
Messy Roots
Laura Gao · 2022
Shares the comingofage thread
Tomboy
Liz Prince · 2014
Shares the comingofage thread
Blood Will Out: The True Story of a Murder, a Mystery, and a Masquerade
Walter Kirn · 2014
Shares the comingofage thread
The Complete Persepolis
Marjane Satrapi · 2023
A definitive collected journey through Satrapi's formative years across revolutionary Iran and European exile, rendered in her signature plain-spoken, visually stark graphic style
The Princess Diarist
Carrie Fisher · 2016
A wry, intimate excavation of young Carrie Fisher's diaries reveals the vulnerable, funny truth behind her Star Wars fame and a hidden youthful romance.
Barbarian days
William Finnegan · 2015
Shares the comingofage thread
Spinning
Tillie Walden · 2017
A quiet, introspective graphic memoir tracing Walden's teenage years in competitive figure skating as she grapples with sexuality, identity, and the isolating pressure of performance.
About Real Friends — what the genome says
Is Real Friends a complete story or a cliffhanger?
It's a complete, standalone-satisfying story.
Who is Real Friends for?
It's written for middle-grade readers (roughly ages 8-12).
Find your next read by its genome
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