Books About Bullying & Standing Up
Stories about dealing with bullies, building resilience, and finding your voice.
159 books
This collection of 159 books about bullying & standing up spans Grade 1–12. Reading level alone doesn't tell parents whether a book is right for a child — text difficulty and emotional weight grow at different rates, especially for gifted, twice-exceptional, or sensitive readers. HootRated rates every book on this list for both, so you can match to your child's actual readiness on both axes.
Across this list, 40% of titles are rated Gentle or Mild — appropriate for sensitive readers or kids reading ahead of their emotional comfort zone. 13% are rated Intense or Very Intense, with heavier thematic territory for readers ready to tackle weighty subjects. Average content intensity for the list is 2.7/5.
Use the intensity badges (color-coded green → red) to filter by emotional readiness rather than just age. For more on what each intensity level means, see our rating methodology.
Little Troll
Penny Dolan
Bully #1
Greg Pak
Snow day!
Lester L. Laminack
Junior Spy
Kiara Kattler
Where the Red Fern Grows
Novel Units Inc.
The Secret Hideout
Susan Hill Long
The dodgeball chronicles
Frank Cammuso
Kyle's Little Sister
BonHyung Jeong
At the farm
Sandy Francis
Karate Kid Saga Continues
Denton J. Tipton
Shipwreck Saturday
Bill Cosby
Just a daydream
Mercer Mayer
Peter Pan
Susan Hill Long
Just a bully
Gina Mayer
Karen's bully
Ann M. Martin
Wild Animals!
Laurent Richard
Air
Tamra B. Orr
Clowns and dragons!
Laurent Richard
Karen's secret
Ann M. Martin
Kickoff blitz
Blake A. Hoena
Presumed missing
Nancy K. Wallace
How I Learned To Fly
R. L. Stine
Karen's School Bus
Ann M. Martin
Oddly normal
Otis Frampton
Broken Chains (Uptown Downtown Series)
Fearon
Insults Aren't Funny
Amanda Doering
Sometimes Jokes Aren't Funny
Amanda Doering
The lightning bugs
Patrick Jennings
Are You Terrified Yet?
Robert Lawrence Stine
Party!
Diana G. Gallagher
Beware!
Diana G. Gallagher
Karen's Half Birthday (Baby-Sitters Little Sister)
Ann M. Martin
My Hero Academia
Kōhei Horikoshi
Robin Hood
Paul D. Storrie
The Little Wood Duck
Brian Wildsmith
Horrible Harry and the dragon war
Suzy Kline
My Friend Slappy
Robert Lawrence Stine
Big Game Jitters
L. M. Nicodemo
Gabby Torres Gets a Billion Followers
Angela Dominguez
Guilty!
Diana G. Gallagher
Just a drop of water
Kerry O'Malley Cerra
Just my rotten luck
James Patterson, Chris Tebbetts
Off Base
Jake Maddox
Revenge of the bully
Scott Starkey
Tomboy : a graphic memoir
Liz Prince
Trouble Talk
Trudy Ludwig
Defiance
Chris Mowry
Scum
James C. Dekker
Trick or Trap
Robert Lawrence Stine
Dealing with teasing
Lisa K. Adams
Horrible Harry and the battle of the bugs
Suzy Kline
My new team
Ryan Howard
The distance between lost and found
Kathryn Holmes
Darius the Great Deserves Better
Adib Khorram
Horrible Harry and the hallway bully
Suzy Kline
Millie and the Great Drought
Natasha Deen
Odd, weird & little
Patrick Jennings
Ghetto cowboy
Greg Neri
Penguins
Emilie U. Lepthien
Pure Spring
Brian Doyle
Armstrong & Charlie
Frank, Steven
Caroline & her sister
Maria D. Wilkes
The skin I'm in
Sharon G. Flake
Claudia and the Little Liar
Ann M. Martin
Pop Hooper's perfect pets
Kyle Mewburn
Slant
Laura E. Williams
Way of the warrior kid
Jocko Willink
Flawless
Sara Shepard
The quick fix
Jack D. Ferraiolo
Under Shifting Stars
Alexandra Latos
Breaking rank
Kristen D. Randle
Cody Simpson
Heather E. Schwartz
Superman Battles the Billionaire Bully
Matthew K. Manning
Adrian and the Tree of Secrets
Hubert
All the rage
Courtney Summers
Black Soldier
John Clarke
Goodbye Marianne (Flyways)
Irene N. Watts
How it feels to have a gay or lesbian parent
Judith E. Snow
Mission (un)popular
Anna Humphrey
My Own Lightning
Lauren Wolk
Nowhere to Hide
Kim Sigafus
Pretty Little Liars
Sara Shepard
The Book Thief
Markus Zusak
The Outsiders
S. E. Hinton
Twilight in Danzig
Siegfried J. Kra
Walk the Edge (Thunder Road Series, Book 2)
Katie McGarry
Wonder
R. J. Palacio
Crushed
Sara Shepard
Over the edge
Patricia H. Rushford
The rookie bookie
L. Jon Wertheim
The war between the classes
Gloria D. Miklowitz
Lost and found
Anne E. Schraff
Safe social networking
Heather E. Schwartz
Twisted
Sara Shepard
Burned
Sara Shepard
Lewis Hamilton
Ryan G. Van Cleave
The air down here
Gil C. Alicea
Camp Average
Craig Battle
Cold Sweat
Franklin W. Dixon
Miles Morales
Jason Reynolds
Okay for now
Gary D. Schmidt
Sins of the father
Norah McClintock
The best Christmas
Jane B. Mason
Circle of secrets
Kimberley Griffiths Little
Matilda
Roald Dahl
Pretty Little Liars #6
Sara Shepard
Super Fly
Todd H. Doodler
Dust
Christine Bongers
Heartless
Sara Shepard
Sins of the Fathers
Chris Lynch
The fight
L. Divine
The stranger game
Cylin Busby
Untitled Amulet Book
Abrams Abrams Books
A Snake Falls to Earth
Darcie Little Badger
Pretty Little Secrets
Sara Shepard
The beginning of after
Jennifer Castle
When bad things happen to bad people
Cynthia Voigt
Dear nobody
Mary Rose
Drama High
L. Divine
Wicked
Sara Shepard
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
J. K. Rowling
Lady J (Drama High)
L. Divine
The Cinderella Society
Kay Cassidy
The outsiders
S. E. Hinton
Grand Canyon
Linda Vieira
Trouble
Gary D. Schmidt
Cold as ice
L. Divine
Bullyville
Francine Prose
Education, Exclusion and Citizenship
Carl Parsons
Emily for Real
Sylvia Gunnery
Kendra
Coe Booth
Mukhtar's Children
Sally Watson
Rites of Passage
Quentin Beresford, Paul Omaji
Seed Time (Signature)
Nick Manns
Subject to Change
Karen Nesbitt
The Austere Academy
Lemony Snicket
The Complete Wreck (A Series of Unfortunate Events, Books 1-13)
Lemony Snicket
Wild Robot
Peter Brown
Zara Hossain Is Here
Sabina Khan
Gulliver's travels
Jonathan Swift
The fallen.
Tom Sniegoski
Coping with interracial dating
Renea D. Nash
Absolute brightness
James Lecesne
Diary of a Wimpy Kid
Jeff Kinney
Ender's Game
Orson Scott Card
Watch me rise
Douglas E. Luffborough
The fallen.
Tom Sniegoski
A Book of Plays
RINEHART AND WINSTON HOLT
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
J. K. Rowling
Mending Horses
M. P. Barker
Social Intercourse
Greg Howard
Supernormal
Meg Jay
The Traitor: Golden Mountain Chronicles
Laurence Yep
City of Strangers
Robert Barnard
Ben Y and the Ghost in the Machine
K. A. Holt
Divergent
Veronica Roth
Indivisible
Daniel Aleman
The Bee Gees
Melinda Bilyeu, Hector Cook, Andrew Môn Hughes
Latinos in the struggle for equal education
James D. Cockcroft
Questions parents ask about this list
- What's on this books about bullying & standing up list?
- Books About Bullying & Standing Up contains 159 books spanning Grade 1–12. Stories about dealing with bullies, building resilience, and finding your voice. Every book on the list is rated for reading level and content intensity so you can pick what matches your child.
- What age range is appropriate for this list?
- Books on this list span Grade 1–12. 63 books (40%) are rated Gentle or Mild; 21 (13%) are rated Intense or Very Intense. Average intensity is 2.7/5. Match the intensity badge to your child's emotional readiness.
- How is this list curated?
- HootRated rates every book on this list for both reading level (text difficulty) and content intensity (emotional weight) — the two axes parents need to choose books. See our methodology for how books make a curated list.