21 Motivational Books For High School Students


Motivation is the key to moving forward towards growth in life. And High School is the most important part of a student’s life.

Teacher app ad banner

For the first time, children come across a strong social lifestyle along with their studies.

If you are also a high school student or a parent of a high school student, have a look at the following motivational books for students.

1. Do Hard Things By Alex and Brett Harris

Today, students have to maintain a certain persona, which includes high grades, party invitations, popularity and other socially accepted parameters.

A little decrease in grades and reduce the esteem level of a student.

“Do Hard Things” is about motivating students to understand the self-value.

This motivational books for students contain some great examples from the history to help readers understand how social and personal changes are possible.

2. The Success Principles for Teens by Jack Canfield and Kent Healy

High school is the time when students dream of becoming a successful person.

But it looks like a long road from what you are now to what you want to become.

Motivation plays a big role when challenges seem too much to handle. Here comes the book, “The Success Principles for Teens”.

The book has showcases proven principles to become a successful person.

Students can understand 23 success strategies along with real-life examples.  


Positive thinking is an important trait that every person should learn in his or her early stage of life.

High school students come across life-changing experiences on a daily basis.

These experiences make them think about the real-life scenarios and what they have learned from parents.

The idea of positive thinking is to motivate students towards the positive sides of things.

4. To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee

Understanding human behavior is a skill that students don’t officially learn during their high school.

However, every student comes across behavioral expressions such as love, humor, hatred, cruelty, kindness and other experiences.

The book, “To Kill a Mockingbird” explores important human behaviors via a fictional story.

This motivational books for students follows the story of a young girl from Alabama and her life in the Southern town.

The crisis strikes and she has to deal with it all by herself. The book explains how human behavior can change the way we feel and see the world around us.

5. I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou and Oprah Winfrey

A childhood leaves a blend of pleasures and pain in our lives.

Some memories are dear to our heart, while others make us feel sad. If not understood wisely, those childhood sorrows can make people lonely.

Popularly known worldwide, “I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings” is a memoir offered by Maya Angelou.

The book is a foreword by the famous Oprah Winfrey.

The book perfectly explains how lonely and insulting childhood doesn’t have to impact your whole life.

You can learn how the correct words can create a big difference in the world.

6. The Last Samurai by Helen DeWitt

This book will become a small course about cultures, language, and intellect for you.

The book offers the story of Sibylla, who is an intellectual single mother.

However, her son exceeds her level of genius. The boy Ludo can read Greek, Japanese, Icelandic Sagas and even advanced calculus.

The story explores Ludo’s abilities and his passion to find his father, as Sibylla doesn’t tell him anything about his father.

Ludo comes across seven potential fathers, according to his imagination and parameters.

The search for the right father makes the story an engaging journey for the readers.

7. The Gift: Creativity and the Artist in the Modern World by Lewis Hyde

The education system can make learning seem very vague.

High School students very often forget about their own intellectual skills and creative sides.

This book follows history, anthropology, and philosophy to charge the creative side of students.

Hence, you can look away from the market-oriented education from time to time and embrace your own thinking ability.

Lewis Hyde talks about understanding and nurturing talents and treating creativity as an alternate economy.

8. Rules for the Unruly: Living an Unconventional Life by Marion Winik

For young souls who look for directions in their lives, this book is a valuable material.

Marion Winik explains how life is not as straightforward as we all think.

The book is a perfect balance of therapy, memoir, and advice.

The motivational dialogues and Winik’s own life scenarios explain how mistakes are a part of growing up.

9. You Can Win by Shiv Khera

Keeping the language simple, Shiv Khera has made his powerful ideas understandable to the young minds.

Though useful for everyone, “You Can Win” is especially beneficial for high school students who are on the verge of becoming an adult.

The book talks about growing your own personality and finding a clear direction towards success. Shiv Khera puts value into positive thinking and peace of mind.

This book is a great lesson for high school students who worry over very small things and live in paranoia.

10. The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini

In High School, students don’t seem to understand much about how their actions can impact their loved ones.

Your attitude towards life decides how your life turns out to be. That is exactly what you find in this book about life.

The book tells the story of two friends who go through a heartbreaking crisis.

You understand how your good or bad actions can impact greatly the life of your closed ones.

11. The Willpower Instinct by Kelly McGonigal

This book is a practical guide for readers to learn willpower. Divided into chapters, the book covers strategies, methods, and goals.

You can learn to manage your emotional state of mind, learn anything you want and bring a permanent positive change.

12. Life of Pi by Yann Martel

Life of Pi tells the story of a young Indian boy surviving a shipwreck.

But he finds himself sharing the lifeboat with a huge Bengal tiger in the middle of the ocean.

The story itself is exciting enough. However, it also tells a lot about how our psychology changes in harrowing situations.

Also Read: Best Inspirational Books For College Students

You learn about how courage takes over the fear, once there is no other way.

From existential crisis to mental self-defense, the book covers all valuable aspects of living a life.

Yann Martel has explained everything with simple yet magical words.

13. Getting to Yes with Yourself by William Ury

The biggest opponent in your life is “You”. Hence, finding a harmony with your thoughts and behavior is the key to getting yes from others.

The book teaches actions you can take to learn your inner-self by questioning your own ideas and looking at everything from a bird-eye view.


Procrastination is probably the biggest problem that holds people from reaching true success.

Reading this book can save high school students from the horrors of procrastination.

Written by an expert on success psychology, Brian Tracy, this book points out the personal problems you face when getting out of a comfort zone.

You can find limitations in your habits and how to resolve them step-by-step.

The book has been translated into 40 languages. So, you can understand the popularity!

15. Make Good Art by Neil Gaiman

Neil Gaiman comprises his own story of refusing higher education and devoting all his life to becoming a master of writing and journalism.

It took him 6 years to start his career. The book explains how art is magical.

The magic that all creative people should attain whether they are a musician, dancer, writer, artist or any other creative kind.

The book motivates to act on things that you think about. So, if you see imaginary places, draw them, write about them or sing a song about that imaginary place.

16. Americanah by ChimamandaNgoziAdichie

Discrimination of any kind is hard to handle for young souls.

Every high school student should give thoughts on how society and home roles work in terms of discrimination.

Then only, can the young minds  live above those discriminations and fight them.

The book tells the story about oppression, home cultures, gender discrimination and race discrimination as well.

The book is a thoughtful and helpful presentation of inequality in the structure of society.

17. Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk

Every child in high school faces multiple phases of psychologies. And every psychology beautifully comes out as a character in the Fight Club.

The novel is a must-read for every student in high school, as they all deal with invisible personality aspects.

Whether it is your habit of clinging to every stuff or the poison of possessiveness in love, the book explains it all…

18. Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman

Every person has to find a balance between thinking abilities and decision making.

The real-life decision-making scenarios start appearing as you enter high school. From career to relationships, you have to make the right choices at every step.

This book, by a Nobel Prize achiever, is a combination of thinking patterns, reactions and decisions a human mind makes.

The book talks about both conscious as well as unconscious thinking abilities of our minds. Reading this can help you discover your own-self and handle your own mindset.

19. The Checklist Manifesto by Atul Gawande

The writer drives attention towards making complex things easier with checklist creation.

Finding a step-by-step process for every task diminishes the chances of mistakes and brings safety, consistency, and correctness.

The teachings of this book are applicable to all kinds of lives. High school students feel motivated to become organized in their daily life.

20. The Four Agreements by don Miguel Ruiz

In life, people tend to make beliefs about themselves, which does nothing but limits the abilities.

The bestselling author describes the source of those beliefs that create suffering for people.

The Four Agreements includes some codes to conduct yourself towards freedom.

The book explains love, freedom, and true happiness.

The book has received admiration from more than 6 million people only in the US.

Plus, there are 40 other language translations of this book.

21. Moonwalking with Einstein by Joshua Foer

High School students put a lot of pressure trying to enhance their mental abilities and memory power.

How about you get proven techniques from the experts?!

In the book, “Moonwalking with Einstein”, Joshua Foer explains the art of remembering everything.

The book explores the one-year of Joshua’s life with mental athletes, their research, and historically available memory sharpening evidence.

The author explains how human memory works and provides tricks to remember everything you want to remember.

This is more of a journalistic presentation of actual experts. Hence, you can rely on the tricks offered.

So, which book has made you excited the most?! Start with the ones you liked the most, then, gradually read all the mentioned books to improve your life as a high school student and beyond.