rachel @ typed truths

The Prospects by K.T. Hoffman

Hope is familiar territory for Gene Ionescu. He has always loved baseball, a sport made for underdogs and optimists like him. He also loves his team, the minor league Beaverton Beavers, and, for the most part, he loves the career he’s built. As the first openly trans player in professional baseball, Gene has nearly everything he’s ever let himself dream of—that is, until Luis Estrada, Gene’s former teammate and current rival, gets traded to the Beavers, destroying the careful equilibrium of Gene’s life. Gene and Luis can’t manage a civil conversation off the field or a competent play on it, but in the close confines… Read more,

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

Transphobia mentioned & deadnaming recounted
Coming out themes
Alcohol consumption & smoking mentioned (secondary character)
Parent with alcoholism recounted
Anxiety & panic attacks
Surgery & needles mentioned
Hospitalisation for fainting from dehydration after a panic attack
Minor sport injury (secondary character)
Death of a father recounted
Car accident recounted*

*Context : A protagonist had a panic attack while driving. Mentions of scars from top surgery, and the use of needles for testosterone injections and ear piercings. A protagonist is adopted by his uncle after his alcoholic mother abandoned him as a child.

A Vocation of Violence by Kerrigan Byrne

No one in London knows what befell Fiona’s family back in Ireland. At least, no one left alive. That is until her late brother’s best mate arrives in the city for the bareknuckle bout of the century. Blood is spilled in the ring before the fight, and when Fiona is hired to clean it up, she finds that the boy from her past is now a dangerous man who may have answers she’d lost all hope of finding. But while she frantically tries to keep his neck from a noose, it becomes apparent that her own is at risk.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

Blood depiction
Death of an infant recounted
Murder
Captivity

Real Americans by Rachel Khong

Real Americans begins on the precipice of Y2K in New York City, when twenty-two-year-old Lily Chen, an unpaid intern at a slick media company, meets Matthew. Matthew is everything Lily is not: easygoing and effortlessly attractive, a native East Coaster and, most notably, heir to a vast pharmaceutical empire. Lily couldn’t be more different: flat-broke, raised in Tampa, the only child of scientists who fled Mao’s Cultural Revolution. Despite all this, Lily and Matthew fall in love. In 2021, fifteen-year-old Nick Chen has never felt like he belonged on the isolated Washington island where he lives with his single mother, Lily. He…. Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

Infertility

Truly, Madly, Deeply by Alexandria Bellefleur

As a bestselling romance novelist, everyone thinks Truly Livingston is an expert on happily-ever-afters. She’s even signed on to record a podcast sharing relationship advice. Little do they know she feels like an imposter—her parents just announced they’re separating, she caught her fiancé cheating, and her entire view on love has been shaken to the core. Truly hopes the podcast will distract her… until she meets her cohost. Her first impression of Colin McCory is…hot. But then he opens his extremely kissable mouth. Colin’s view on love just pisses Truly off, even if he does have an annoyingly attractive face. Bickering with a cynical… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

Biphobia
Infidelity
Alcohol consumption

The Last Boyfriends Rules for Revenge by Matthew Hubbard

Ezra Hayes has always felt like a background character compared to BFFs Lucas and Finley. He would do anything to be seen as a romantic lead, even if it means keeping a secret summer boyfriend, Presley. But when he discovers that Presley is a lying cheater, and his best friends are having boy problems of their own, they want revenge. Their plans to get even involve sabotaging the largest party of the year, entering a drag competition, and even having Ezra run against his ex for Winter Formal King. Then the school district starts to actively censor queer voices with their Watch What You Say initiative. Taking to TikTok to vent… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

Homophobia

Colton Gentry’s Third Act by Jeff Zentner

Colton Gentry is riding high. His first hit in nearly a decade has caught fire, he’s opening for country megastar Brant Lucas, and he’s married to one of the hottest acts in the country. But he’s hurting. Only a few weeks earlier, his best friend, Duane, was murdered onstage by a mass shooter at a country music festival. One night, with his trauma festering and Jim Beam flowing through his veins, Colton stands before a sold-out arena crowd of country music fans and offers his unfiltered opinion on guns. It goes over poorly. Immediately, his career and marriage… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

Alcoholism
Grief & loss depiction
Death of a friend & parent
Mass shooting discussed

How to Become the Dark Lord and Die Trying by Django Wexler

Davi has done this all before. She’s tried to be the hero and take down the all-powerful Dark Lord. A hundred times she’s rallied humanity and made the final charge. But the time loop always gets her in the end. Sometimes she’s killed quickly. Sometimes it takes a while. But she’s been defeated every time. This time? She’s done being the hero and done being stuck in this endless time loop. If the Dark Lord always wins, then maybe that’s who she needs to be. It’s Davi’s turn to play on the winning side.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

Sexual assault mentioned
Suicide & self-harm

Cross the Line by Simone Soltani

Formula 1 driver Dev Anderson’s career is on the line. After a social media disaster leaves him with an angry team and sponsors threatening to jump ship, he needs someone to help save his image. At a party in Monaco, he bumps into the woman who can fix it all. There’s just one problem: she’s his best friend’s little sister. And, okay, maybe there’s another problem—he kissed her last year and hasn’t been able to stop thinking about it since. Recent college grad Willow Williams needs a job. She may have a talent for seeing the bright side of any bad situation, but it’s hard to stay positive when she’s struggling to get hired. So when Dev… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

Chronic joint illness & pain (protagonist)

Gay the Pray Away by Natalie Naudus

Valerie Danners is in a cult. She just doesn’t know it yet. When she finds a queer book at the library and smuggles it home, her conservative Christian home-schooling world begins to crack. And when the cutest girl she’s ever met shows up to Bible class, she starts to question everything. Riley is so confident and kind, and she and Valerie bond quickly over existing as multiracial teens in a very white Christian community. As Valerie explores her feelings for Riley, she begins to see that the world she knows is a carefully crafted narrative. Publicly, the girls are close friends… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

Religious trauma & homophobia (theme)
Physical child abuse mentioned
Self-harm (self-flagellation)
Emesis

Triple Sec by T.J. Alexander

As a bartender at Terror & Virtue, a swanky New York City cocktail lounge known for its romantic atmosphere and Insta-worthy drinks, Mel has witnessed plenty of disastrous dates. That, coupled with her own romantic life being in shambles, has Mel convinced love doesn’t exist. Everything changes when Bebe walks into the bar. She’s beautiful, funny, knows her whiskeys—and is happily married to her partner, Kade. Mel’s resigned to forget the whole thing, but Bebe makes her a unique since she and Kade have an open marriage, she’s interested in taking Mel on a date. What… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

Transphobia
Divorce recounted (protagonist)
Alcohol consumption