"The Outsiders" by S. E. Hinton

I first read The Outsiders when I was fourteen, same age as the protagonist, Ponyboy.  I had known that I led a safe, sheltered life, but it wasn't until I read this book that I truly realized how different my life was from what it could be.  It's one of the first books I can remember reading that felt very real to me, not like a made-up story.   I didn't learn until many years later that this was inspired by actual events, but somehow it has always felt real, right from the fi...