rachel @ typed truths

Peta Lyre’s Rating Normal by Anna Whateley

Peta Lyre’s Rating Normal by Anna Whateley

Peta Lyre is far from typical. The world she lives in isn’t designed for the way her mind works, but when she follows her therapist’s rules for ‘normal’ behaviour, she can almost fit in without attracting attention.

When a new girl, Sam, starts at school, Peta’s carefully structured routines start to crack. But on the school ski trip, with romance blooming and a newfound confidence, she starts to wonder if maybe she can have a normal life after all.

When things fall apart, Peta must decide whether all the old rules still matter.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Sexual harassment
Domestic violence
Poverty themes

The Boy from the Mish by Gary Lonesborough

The Boy from the Mish by Gary Lonesborough

It’s a hot summer, and life’s going all right for Jackson and his family on the Mish. It’s almost Christmas, school’s out, and he’s hanging with his mates, teasing the visiting tourists, avoiding the racist boys in town. Just like every year, Jackson’s Aunty and annoying little cousins visit from the city – but this time a mysterious boy with a troubled past comes with them… As their friendship evolves, Jackson must confront the changing shapes of his relationships with his friends, family and community. And he must face his darkest secret – a secret he thought he’d locked away for good

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Racism & racial slurs
Homomisia, internalised homomisia & homomisic slurs
Coming out themes
Outing
Parental abandonment
Physical child abuse recounted
Domestic violence recounted
Alcohol consumption
Recreational drug use
Emesis
Minor physical injuries, including broken bones & snake bite
Police violence & racial profiling
Incarceration

You Were Made For Me by Jenna Guillaume

You Were Made For Me by Jenna Guillaume

The day I created a boy started out like any other.

Katie didn’t mean to create a boy. A boy like a long-lost Hemsworth brother: six-foot tall with floppy hair and eyes like the sky on a clear summer’s day; whose lips taste like cookie-dough and whose skin smells like springtime.

A boy who is completely devoted to Katie.

He was meant to be perfect.

But he was never meant to exist.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Fatmisia & body shaming
Cancer mentioned
Death of a parent
Bullying

The Erasure Initiative by Lili Wilkinson

The Erasure Initiative by Lili Wilkinson

A girl wakes up on a self-driving bus. She has no memory of how she got there or who she is. Her nametag reads CECILY. The six other people on the bus are just like her: no memories, only nametags. There’s a screen on each seatback that gives them instructions. A series of tests begin, with simulations projected onto the front window of the bus. The passengers must each choose an outcome; majority wins. But as the testing progresses, deadly secrets are revealed, and the stakes get higher and higher. Soon Cecily is no longer just fighting for her freedom – she’s fighting for her life.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Self harm
Blood depiction
Amputation
Murder
Gun violence
Car accident

When It Drops by Alex Dyson

When It Drops by Alex Dyson

Caleb Clifford has earbuds, not real buds. And he prefers it that way. They always give him what he wants to hear, he can adjust the volume, and if things get tangled, it’s relatively easy to straighten them out again …

Sixteen-year-old songwriter and aspiring social outcast Caleb Clifford fills his world with music, but – like most things – keeps his songs to himself. That is until his little brother leaks Caleb’s most personal track online; a track that’s quite obviously about his secret crush. Having his innermost feelings (accompanied by a funky bassline) go viral is not Caleb’s idea of a good time. But is this the end of everything, or the start?

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Cancer
Emesis
Grief & loss depiction
Death of a parent recounted
Bullying recounted

Fin and Rye and Fireflies by Harry Cook

Fin & Rye & Fireflies by Harry Cook

Then, only a few days later, Fin’s world is turned upside down – and not in a good head-over-heels-in-love way – when Jesse cruelly outs him. An event which ultimately leads to his family leaving town.

But a fresh start isn’t going to change the truth of who Fin is. And it’s not going to stop his sexuality causing everyone all sorts of problems. Everyone, that is, apart from his new best friend Poppy, her girlfriend-in-waiting June, and his new crush Rye… So, while Fin and Rye are enjoying some seriously intimate moonlit moments together, Fin’s parents decide to pack him off to the local ReSouled ‘therapy camp’.

It’s a nightmare – and there’s no easy way out.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Homomisia
Transmisia
Conversion therapy
Anxiety & anxiety attacks
Alcohol consumption

Boy Queen by George Lester

Boy Queen by George Lester

While his friends prepare to head off to university, Robin is looking at a pile of rejection letters from drama schools up and down the country, and facing a future without the people he loves the most. Everything seems like it’s ending, and Robin is scrabbling to find his feet.

Unsure about what to do next and whether he has the talent to follow his dreams, he and his best friends go and drown their sorrows at a local drag show, where Robin realises there might be a different, more sequinned path for him . . .

With a mother who won’t stop talking, a boyfriend who won’t acknowledge him and a best friend who is dying to cover him in glitter make up, there’s only one thing for Robin to do: bring it to the runway.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Homomisia & homomisic slurs
Hate crimes
Physical assault

Am I Normal Yet? by Holly Bourne

Am I Normal Yet? by Holly Bourne

All Evie wants is to be normal. She’s almost off her meds and at a new college where no one knows her as the girl-who-went-crazy. She’s even going to parties and making friends. There’s only one thing left to tick off her list…

But relationships are messy – especially relationships with teenage guys. They can make any girl feel like they’re going mad. And if Evie can’t even tell her new friends Amber and Lottie the truth about herself, how will she cope when she falls in love?

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Ableism
Anxiety
Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
Intrusive thoughts
Self harm
Alcohol abuse
Drug abuse

The Places I’ve Cried in Public by Holly Bourne

The Places I’ve Cried in Public by Holly Bourne

Amelie loved Reese. And she thought he loved her. But she’s starting to realise love isn’t supposed to hurt like this. So now she’s retracing their story and untangling what happened by revisiting all the places he made her cry.

Because if she works out what went wrong, perhaps she can finally learn to get over him.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Emotional & verbal abuse
Rape
Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)

A Wicked Magic Is by Sasha Laurens

A Wicked Magic by Sasha Laurens

Dan and Liss are witches. The Black Book granted them that power. Harnessing that power feels good, especially when everything in their lives makes them feel powerless.

During a spell gone wrong, Liss’s boyfriend is snatched away by an evil entity and presumed dead. Dan and Liss’s friendship dies that night, too. How can they practice magic after the darkness that they conjured?

Months later, Liss discovers that her boyfriend is alive, trapped underground in the grips of an ancient force. She must save him, and she needs Dan and the power of The Black Book to do so… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Parental abuse
Statutory rape
Suicidal ideation
Self-harm
Religious cults