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Realistic Fiction

Realistic fiction is kind of a newcomer to the long list of literary genres. Primarily aimed at children and adolescents (the corresponding genre in adult literature is usually just called "literary fiction"), realistic fiction is recognizable by its relatable characters and situations. What sets it apart from historical fiction is that the stories do not center around an actual historical event or person, though they may be set in a very real time period.

Characters deal with the things everyone else deals with—death, friendship, loneliness, embarrassment, first love—and they don't get transported to a make-believe island as a solution to their problems. They have to work it out, which is one of the main appeals of this genre; kids like to read about other kids (real or imaginary) going through the typical young person's trials and how they deal with it.

Not that all realistic fiction is sad and gloomy. It's just what it sounds like—stories about real-life from a fresh perspective. Also, we aren't suggesting there are no realistic elements to a fantasy like The Voyage of the Dawn Treader: there are, which is precisely what makes reading that book so rewarding. It's just that real kids don't fight literal dragons, they fight bullies, or their own insecurities, or ferocious acne.

A lot of the best and most-loved stories fall squarely within the limits of realistic fiction. Huckleberry Finn wasn't a real pirate, but he really rafted the Mississippi; Anne Shirley wasn't a Medieval princess, but she really became Matthew and Marilla's daughter; Anna and Caleb Witting aren't big on imagination, but they are big on really accepting Sarah into their family (at least, eventually).

The full range of human experience is explored in these stories, its darkness, its light, its sorrow, its joy. This is the purpose of literature, after all: to show us true life, and in showing us, to better prepare us for it. These books are some of the best at doing just that.

Review by C. Hollis Crossman
C. Hollis Crossman used to be a child. Now he's a husband and father who loves church, good food, and weird stuff. He might be a mythical creature, but he's definitely not a centaur. Read more of his reviews here.
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93 Items found Print
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Active Filters: 11th grade (Ages 16-17), Hardcover
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Reader's Digest World's Best Reading
by Mark Twain
from Reader's Digest
Realistic Fiction for 7th-Adult
in 19th Century Literature (Location: LIT6-19)
All Creatures Great and Small / All Things Bright and Beautiful
James Herriot Series Book 1
by James Herriot
from MJF Books
Realistic Fiction for 7th-Adult
in Animal Stories (Location: FIC-ANI)
Beloved Bondage
by Elizabeth Yates
from People's Book Club
for 9th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$4.80 (1 in stock)
Berliners
by Vesper Stamper
from Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.
for 7th-12th grade
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
$18.69
Best of James Herriot
by James Herriot
from St. Martin's Press
for 10th-Adult
in Animal Stories (Location: FIC-ANI)
Best of James Herriot
by James Herriot
from St. Martin's Press
for 10th-Adult
in Animal Stories (Location: FIC-ANI)
Born Free
by Joy Adamson
Anniversary from Pantheon Books
for 10th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$7.20 (1 in stock)
Buffalo Coat
by Carol Ryrie Brink
for 9th-Adult
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
C. W. Anderson's Favorite Horse Stories
by C. W. Anderson
from E.P. Dutton & Co.
for 4th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
Children of the River
by Linda Crew
from Delacorte Press
for 9th-12th grade
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
$4.80 (2 in stock)
Complete Novels of Jane Austen
by Jane Austen
from Canterbury Classics
for 10th-Adult
in 19th Century Literature (Location: LIT6-19)
$25.00
David Copperfield
Reader's Digest World's Best Reading
by Charles Dickens
from Reader's Digest
for 9th-Adult
in 19th Century Literature (Location: LIT6-19)
Death Walk
by Walt Morey
1st edition from Blue Heron Publishing
for 10th-12th grade
in Action & Adventure Stories (Location: FIC-ADV)
Eugenie Grandet
by Honore de Balzac, translated by Ellen Marriage, introduction by Richard Aldington, illustrations by Rene ben Sussan
from Heritage Press
for 10th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$8.00 (1 in stock)
Everything Sad Is Untrue
by Daniel Nayeri
from Levine Querido
for 11th-Adult
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
$16.14
Good-bye, Mr. Chips
Reader's Digest World's Best Reading
by James Hilton
1st edition from Reader's Digest
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Good-bye, Mr. Chips
by James Hilton
Reprint from Little, Brown & Company
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Grapes of Wrath
by John Steinbeck, illustrated by James Hays
from Reader's Digest
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Grapes of Wrath
by John Steinbeck
3rd printing from Viking Press
for 9th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
Great Expectations
by Charles Dickens, illustrated by Scott McKowen
from Sterling Publishing Co.
for 8th-Adult
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
Great Expectations
Reader's Digest World's Best Reading
by Charles Dickens
from Reader's Digest
Realistic Fiction for 10th-12th grade
in 19th Century Literature (Location: LIT6-19)
Greyfriars Bobby
by Eleanor Atkinson
from Grosset & Dunlap
for 6th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
Half-Crown House
by Helen Ashton
Book Club Edition from Dodd, Mead & Co.
for 9th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$9.60 (1 in stock)
Head of the House of Coombe
by Frances Hodgson Burnett
from Frederick A. Stokes Company
for 9th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
Home Has a Heart
by Thyra Ferre Bjorn
from Holt, Rinehart and Winston
for 7th-Adult
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
How the Heather Looks
by Joan Bodger
Reprint from Living Book Press
for 7th-Adult
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
$21.24
Hunger
by Knut Hamsun
Fifth Printing, 1967 from Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.
for 10th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$48.00 (1 in stock)
I Heard the Owl Call My Name
by Margaret Craven
Book Club from Doubleday & Company
for 8th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
In His Steps
by Charles M. Sheldon
from Hendrickson Publishers
for 9th grade-Adult
in Hendrickson Christian Classics (Location: XCL-DEV)
$6.00 (1 in stock)
In His Steps
by Charles M. Sheldon
from Grosset & Dunlap
for 9th-Adult
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
$11.20 (1 in stock)
James Herriot's Favorite Dog Stories
by James Herriot
First Printing from St. Martin's Press
for 8th-Adult
in Animal Stories (Location: FIC-ANI)
Jane Eyre
Illustrated Junior Library Series 4
by Charlotte Bronte
from Grosset & Dunlap
Realistic Romantic Fiction for 8th-12th grade
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
Jane Eyre
Portland House Illustrated Classics
by Charlotte Bronte, illustrated by Monroe S. Orr
from Portland House
Gothic Romance for 8th-Adult
in 19th Century Literature (Location: LIT6-19)
Jane Eyre
by Charlotte Bronte, illustrated by Fritz Eichenberg
from Random House
Realistic Romantic Fiction for 8th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
Jane Eyre
by Charlotte Bronte, illustrated by Edward A. Wilson
from Random House
Realistic Romantic Fiction for 8th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Jane Eyre
Rainbow Classics
by Charlotte Bronte, illustrated by Nell Booker
from World Publishing Company
Realistic Romantic Fiction for 8th-12th grade
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
Jane Eyre & Wuthering Heights - 2 Volume Set
by Charlotte Bronte and Emily Bronte, illustrated by Fritz Eichenberg
from Random House
Realistic Romantic Fiction for 8th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
Jungle Books
Macmillan Classics
by Rudyard Kipling, illustrated by Robert Shore
from Macmillan
Animal Stories for 7th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
King's Jackal
by Richard Harding Davis
from Charles Scribner's Sons
for 10th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$9.60 (1 in stock)
Lawrenceville Stories
by Owen Johnson
from Simon and Schuster
for 8th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
Life With Father
Reader's Digest World's Best Reading
by Clarence Day
from Reader's Digest
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Little Women
by Lousia May Alcott, illustrated by Harve Stein
from Garden City Books
Realistic Romantic Fiction for 9th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
Living Free
by Joy Adamson
from Harcourt, Brace & World
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Love and Other Great Expectations
by Becky Dean
from Delacorte Press
for 8th-12th grade
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
$15.29
Man Who Saved Robinson Crusoe
by James Poling
from W. W. Norton and Co.
for 7th-Adult
in Vintage History & Biographies (Location: VIN-HIS)
Moment Comes
by Jennifer Bradbury
from Atheneum
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
$15.29
Mrs. Appleyard and I
by Louise Andrews Kent
from Houghton Mifflin
for 10th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
My Cousin Rachel
by Daphne du Maurier
from Doubleday & Company
Mystery/Suspense for 9th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$4.80 (1 in stock)
My Favorite Songs
by Maria Trapp
from Veritas Press
for Kindergarten-Adult
in Historical Fiction (Location: FIC-HIF)
$17.00
My Heart Lies South
by Elizabeth Borton de Treviño
from Thomas Y. Crowell & Co.
Biography for 10th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
Oliver Twist
Sterling Classics
by Charles Dickens, illustrated by Scott McKowen
Unabridged from Sterling Publishing Co.
Realistic Fiction for 10th-12th grade
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
Oliver Twist
Books of Wonder
by Charles Dickens (illustrated by Don Freeman)
from HarperCollins
Realistic Fiction for 9th-Adult
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
One Big Open Sky
by Lesa Cline-Ransome
from Holiday House
for 6th-Adult
2025 Newbery Honor Book
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
$16.14
Outlaws of Halfaday Creek
by James B. Hendryx
from A. L. Burt Company
for 8th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$16.00 (1 in stock)
Papa's Wife
by Thyra Ferre Bjorn
from Rinehart & Company, Inc.
for 7th-Adult
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
Penrod
by Booth Tarkington, illustrated by Gordon Grant
from Grosset & Dunlap
Realistic Fiction for 7th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
Place Apart
by Paula Fox
from Farrar, Straus and Giroux
for 7th-12th grade
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
$6.40 (1 in stock)
Potlatch Family
by Evelyn Sibley Lampman
1st edition from Atheneum
for 6th-12th grade
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
Pride and Prejudice
Rainbow Classics
by Jane Austen, illustrated by Edgard Cirlin
from World Publishing Company
Romantic Realistic Fiction for 8th-Adult
in 19th Century Literature (Location: LIT6-19)
Ramona
by Helen Hunt Jackson, illustrated by N. C. Wyeth
from Little, Brown & Company
for 9th-Adult
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
Ramona
by Helen Jackson
from Little, Brown & Company
for 9th-12th grade
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$14.00 (1 in stock)
Ranch under the Rimrock
by Dorothy Lawson McCall
from Binford & Mort Publishing
for 8th-Adult
in Vintage History & Biographies (Location: VIN-HIS)
Robinson Crusoe
by Daniel Defoe
from Doubleday & Company
for 9th-Adult
in Action & Adventure Stories (Location: FIC-ADV)
Robinson Crusoe (abridged)
Illustrated Junior Library Series 2
by Daniel Defoe, illustrated by Lynd Ward
from Grosset & Dunlap
for 10th-Adult
in Illustrated Junior Library (Location: VIN-FIC)
Robinson Crusoe (abridged)
Illustrated Junior Library Series 3
by Daniel Defoe, illustrated by Lynd Ward
from Grosset & Dunlap
for 10th-Adult
in Action & Adventure Stories (Location: FIC-ADV)
Room Made of Windows
by Eleanor Cameron, illustrated by Trina Schart Hyman
from Little, Brown & Company
for 7th-12th grade
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
$8.00 (1 in stock)
Roots
by Alex Haley
Book Club Edition from Doubleday & Company
for 11th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$4.80 (1 in stock)
Rose O' the River
by Kate Douglas Wiggin
First Edition from Century Co.
for 7th-12th grade
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
School at Thrush Green
by Miss Read (Mrs. Dora Saint), illustrated by John S. Goodall
First American Edition from Houghton Mifflin
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$9.00 (1 in stock)
Shepherd of the Hills
by Harold Bell Wright
from Shepherd of the Hills Historical Society
for 9th-12th grade
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$5.00 (1 in stock)
Shepherd of the Hills
by Harold Bell Wright; illustrated by F. Graham Cootes
from A. L. Burt Company
for 9th-12th grade
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$11.20 (1 in stock)
Snow Goose
by Paul Gallico
from Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.
for 7th-12th grade
in Historical Fiction (Location: FIC-HIF)
$16.96 $11.20 (3 in stock)
Son of a Hundred Kings
by Thomas B. Costain
from Doubleday & Company
for 7th-12th grade
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$4.80 (1 in stock)
Story of Elsa
by Joy Adamson
First American Edition from Harcourt, Brace & World
for 10th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$7.20 (1 in stock)
Tale of Two Cities
Illustrated Junior Library Series 2
by Charles Dickens, illustrated by Rafaello Busoni
from Grosset & Dunlap
Victorian Novel for 9th-Adult
in Illustrated Junior Library (Location: VIN-FIC)
Tale of Two Cities
Illustrated Junior Library Series 1
by Charles Dickens, illustrated by Rafaello Busoni
from Grosset & Dunlap
Victorian Novel for 9th-Adult
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
Tale of Two Cities
Illustrated Junior Library Series 3
by Charles Dickens, illustrated by Rafaello Busoni
from Grosset & Dunlap
Victorian Novel for 9th-Adult
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
Tale of Two Cities
Illustrated Junior Library Series 2
by Charles Dickens, illustrated by Rafaello Busoni
from Grosset & Dunlap
Victorian Novel for 9th-Adult
in Illustrated Junior Library (Location: VIN-FIC)
Tale of Two Cities
by Charles Dickens
from Parents Magazine Press
for 9th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$3.20 (1 in stock)
The Help
by Kathryn Stockett
from G.P. Putnam's Sons
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Then There Grew Up a Generation....
by Thyra Ferre Bjorn
1st edition from Holt, Rinehart and Winston
for 9th-12th grade
in Realistic Fiction (Location: FIC-REA)
Three Against the Wilderness
by Eric Collier
6th Printing, 1960 from E.P. Dutton & Co.
for 8th-12th grade
in Vintage History & Biographies (Location: VIN-HIS)
Tree Grows in Brooklyn
by Betty Smith
from Harper Perennial
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$18.99
Tree Grows in Brooklyn
by Betty Smith
from The Blakiston Company
for 10th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
When a Man's a Man
by Harold Bell Wright
from The Book Supply Company
for 9th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
Wuthering Heights with Related Readings
by Emily Bronte
from McGraw-Hill
Realistic Fiction for 9th-12th grade
in 19th Century Literature (Location: LIT6-19)
Yankee Lawyer
by Arthur Cheney Train
from Consolidated Book Publishers
for 10th-Adult
in Vintage Fiction & Literature (Location: VIN-FIC)
$8.00 (1 in stock)
Yearling
by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings & N. C. Wyeth
from Charles Scribner's Sons
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$16.00 (1 in stock)
Yearling
Reader's Digest World's Best Reading
by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
from Reader's Digest
for 8th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Yearling
by Marjorie Rawlings
from International Collectors Library
Realistic Animal Stories for 6th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Yearling
by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings & N. C. Wyeth
from Charles Scribner's Sons
for 9th-Adult
in Scribner Illustrated Classics (Location: FIC-SCRIB)
$25.49
Yearling
by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings & N. C. Wyeth
from Charles Scribner's Sons
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Yearling
by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, foreword by Patricia Reilly Giff
from Aladdin Books
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$8.00 (1 in stock)
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