rachel @ typed truths

Camp by Lev AC Rosen

Camp by Lev A.C. Rosen

Sixteen-year-old Randy Kapplehoff loves spending the summer at Camp Outland, a camp for queer teens. It’s where he met his best friends. It’s where he takes to the stage in the big musical. And it’s where he fell for Hudson Aaronson-Lim – who’s only into straight-acting guys and barely knows not-at-all-straight-acting Randy even exists.

This year, though, it’s going to be different. Randy has reinvented himself as ‘Del’ – buff, masculine, and on the market. Even if it means giving up show tunes, nail polish, and his unicorn bedsheets, he’s determined to get Hudson to fall for him… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Homomisia, internalised homomisia & homomisic slurs
Bimisia
Transmisia
Death of a grandparent, off-page
Bullying

The Wysman by Dorothy A Winsor

The Wysman by Dorothy A. Winsor

Former street kid Jarka was born with a crooked foot and uses a crutch, but that no longer matters now that he’s an apprentice Wysman, training to advise the king. When poor kids start to go missing from the city’s streets, though, Jarka suspects that whatever’s causing the disappearances comes from the castle.

Now he needs to watch his step or risk losing the position he fought so hard to win… but when someone close to him becomes the latest victim, Jarka knows he’s running out of time. His search takes him from diving into ancient history to standing up to those who want to beat or bleed the magic out of him… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Ableism & internalised ableism
Physical assault

The Black Kids by Christina Hammonds Reed

The Black Kids by Christina Hammonds Reed

Los Angeles, 1992

Ashley Bennett and her friends are living the charmed life. It’s the end of senior year and they’re spending more time at the beach than in the classroom. They can already feel the sunny days and endless possibilities of summer.

Everything changes one afternoon in April, when four LAPD officers are acquitted after beating a black man named Rodney King half to death. Suddenly, Ashley’s not just one of the girls. She’s one of the black kids… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Fatmisia & body shaming
Lesbomisia
Homomisia
Racism & racist slurs
Colourism
Parental abse
Domestic abuse
Cheating
Sexual harassment
Attempted suicide mentioned
Alcohol consumption & abuse
Recreational drug use & abuse
Blood depiction & physical injuries
AIDS mentioned
Riots
Police brutality & racial profiling
Gun violence
Lynching
Physical assault
Wildfires

Foxen Bloom by Parker Foye

Foxen Bloom by Parker Foye

Season after season, hunters have attempted to capture the white-tailed stag. Local legend holds that its capture promises prosperity, and in a land that is dying—to hunger, to war; to a magical curse, some say—even a whisper of hope is a powerful lure. Yet every hunter who tries fails, never to leave the forest. Fenton, god of the forest, yet imprisoned within its borders, watches from his place in the trees as the hunters first despoil and then fall to his land, dispassionate as his deadwood heart.

Prior doesn’t hope to capture the stag or secure prosperity. He has a far bolder hunt in mind: to entreat the god of the forest to save his sister from the sickness sweeping the land… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Self harm
Blood depiction & physical injury
Body horror
Emesis
Pandemic (contagious magical illness)
Kidnapping
Animal death

Love’s Recipe by Mila Nicks

Love’s Recipe by Mila Nicks

Can two strangers down on their luck discover the flavor of love?

Rosalie Underwood is a broke, recently divorced single mother. After she’s forced to return to her hometown St. Aster, Louisiana, she lands a waitressing job at Ady’s Creole Café. Life’s not done giving her lemons just yet, though. Ady’s Creole Café is on the brink of going out of business. If Rosalie hopes to recover from her disastrous marriage and keep her job, she must figure out a way to save the restaurant. But the only question is how?… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Depression, mentioned
Grief & loss depiction
Death of a mother

Accidentally Engaged by Farah Heron

Accidentally Engaged by Farah Heron

Reena Manji doesn’t love her career, her single status, and most of all, her family inserting themselves into every detail of her life. But when caring for her precious sourdough starters, Reena can drown it all out. At least until her father moves his newest employee across the hall–with hopes that Reena will marry him.

But Nadim’s not like the other Muslim bachelors-du-jour that her parents have dug up. If the Captain America body and the British accent weren’t enough, the man appears to love eating her bread creations as much as she loves making them. She sure as hell would never marry a man who works for her father, but friendship with a neighbor is okay, right? … Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Fatmisia & body shaming
Eating disorder recounted & disordered food thoughts
Cheating mentioned
Alcohol consumption
Recreational drug use mentioned
Pregnancy mentioned
Cancer mentioned
Death of a mother mentioned

Float Plan by Trish Doller

Float Plan by Trish Doller

Since the loss of her fiancé, Anna has been shipwrecked by grief—until a reminder goes off about a trip they were supposed to take together. Impulsively, Anna goes to sea in their sailboat, intending to complete the voyage alone.

But after a treacherous night’s sail, she realizes she can’t do it by herself and hires Keane, a professional sailor, to help. Much like Anna, Keane is struggling with a very different future than the one he had planned. As romance rises with the tide, they discover that it’s never too late to chart a new course.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Depression
Suicide
Grief & loss depiction
Death of a fiancé

Meet Me in Paradise by Libby Hubscher

Meet Me in Paradise by Libby Hubscher

Ever since her journalist mother died on assignment, Marin has played it safe, refusing to set foot outside the state of Tennessee. Her wild-child younger sister, Sadie, has trotted the globe as a photographer, living off of art and adrenaline.

When Sadie returns from a tough assignment abroad and looks a little worse for wear, Marin reluctantly agrees to a sisters’ spa weekend on the tropical island of Saba. But her lifelong fear of travel is affirmed when Sadie misses the flight, Marin’s luggage gets mixed up with another passenger’s, and an episode of turbulence sends her hurtling into the lap of Lucas Tsai, the handsome stranger who stole her sister’s seat… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Anxiety
Cancer
Grief & loss depiction
Death of a mother recounted

Dial A for Aunties by Jesse Q Sutanto

Dial A for Aunties by Jesse Q. Sutanto

When Meddelin Chan ends up accidentally killing her blind date, her meddlesome mother calls for her even more meddlesome aunties to help get rid of the body. Unfortunately, a dead body proves to be a lot more challenging to dispose of than one might anticipate, especially when it is accidentally shipped in a cake cooler to the over-the-top billionaire wedding Meddy, her Ma, and aunties are working, at an island resort on the California coastline. It’s the biggest job yet for their family wedding business—“Don’t leave your big day to chance, leave it to the Chans!”—and nothing, not even an unsavory corpse, will get in the way of her auntie’s perfect buttercream cake flowers… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Racism
Threats of sexual assault
Dead bodies
Murder

Hana Khan Carries On by Uzma Jalaluddin

Hana Khan Carries On by Uzma Jalaluddin

Sales are slow at Three Sisters Biryani Poutine, the only halal restaurant in the close-knit Golden Crescent neighbourhood. Hana waitresses there part time, but what she really wants is to tell stories on the radio. If she can just outshine her fellow intern at the city radio station, she may have a chance at landing a job. In the meantime, Hana pours her thoughts and dreams into a podcast, where she forms a lively relationship with one of her listeners. But soon she’ll need all the support she can get: a new competing restaurant, a more upscale halal place, is about to open in the Golden Crescent, threatening Three Sisters… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Misogyny
Racism
Islamophobia
Gentrification
Hate crimes
Pregnancy
Chronic illness
Bullying