Book recommendations for a 12-year-old girl?

[marni]

if your daughter is into sci fi fiction a few classics like Anne Macaffreys Dragonrider series or something like "the ship who sang" might be fun. Also some of the Heinlein stuff,"the cat who walked through walls", the triology "time enough for love , "Methusalahs Children",The Notebooks of Lazarus Long" and the short story ""the door into summer. Of course there are also the Ray Bradbury classics "The Martian Chronicles" and "Golden Apples of the Sun." on a more fantasy and less sci fi line there are several (actually I never read one I didn't like) Charles De Lint books, "Dreams and Memories" "The Onion Girl" and "Savaha" which are deeply complex with multiple layers of stories and characters and beautifully and compelling story lines.

marni

[skhill]

The Once and Future King was my favorite book around that age. And how about Ursula LeGuin's Earthsea Trilogy?

That's such a fantastic gift request from a girl that age! Sounds like you have a great niece.

[indysteel]

I suppose they're a little dated at this point, but I loved Katherine Patterson's books as a teen. Jacob Have I Loved is still one of my favorites. I loved all of Madeleine L'Engle's, too. She has a number of good books in addition to the Wrinkle in Time series.

[Tri Girl]

I teach middle school and here is what's been hot lately:

Hunger Games series (Suzanne Collins)
Eragon series (Christopher Paolini)
Alex Rider series (Anthony Horowitz)
most things written by Meg Cabot