Category Archives: Entries

Swimming at Night by Lucy Clarke

People go traveling for two reasons: because they are searching for something, or they are running from something. Katie’s world is shattered by the news that her headstrong and bohemian younger sister, Mia, has been found dead at the bottom of a cliff in Bali. The authorities say that Mia jumped—that her death was a suicide. Although they’d hardly spoken to each other since Mia suddenly left on an around-the-world trip six months earlier, Katie refuses to accept that her sister would have taken her own life. Distraught that they never made peace, Katie leaves her order… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Parental abandonment recounted
  • Suicide discussed
  • Death of a sister
  • Death of a mother from cancer
  • Death of a father from suicide mentioned

The Hike by Lucy Clarke

Maggie, Liz, Helena & Joni. Old friends bound by history, adventures, old secrets. And now, bound by murder. They lace up their hiking boots for the adventure of a lifetime in the Norwegian wilderness: a place of towering mountains, glass-like lakes, log cabins and forests stolen from a fairytale. It’s the perfect place to lose yourself – until a broken body is found at the bottom of a ravine. Somewhere out there, someone knows exactly why a woman has died. And in this deep, dark wilderness, there’s a killer on the trail . . .

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Infidelity
  • Substance addiction & drug abuse
  • Unplanned pregnancy
  • Cancer mentioned
  • Death of a parent
  • Landside
  • Animal hunting

Dead Happy by Josh Silver

Friends. Welcome to Elmhallow. Seb, along with a select group of participants, finds himself washed up on an isolated island called Elmhallow, under the guardianship of a mysterious couple. As the experiment steps up another level, Seb is forced to team up with Eleanor once more. But where is Finn? And what does HappyHead have in store for them next?

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Homophobia
  • Eugenics
  • Suicide mentioned
  • Drug use recounted
  • Blood & injury depiction
  • Emesis mentioned
  • Murder & torture
  • Physical assault
  • Animal death & cruelty

HappyHead by Josh Silver

We are in an epidemic. An epidemic of unhappiness. Friends, here is the good news: HappyHead has the answer. When Seb is offered a place on a radical retreat designed to solve the national crisis of teenage unhappiness, he is determined to change how people see him and make his parents proud. But as he finds himself drawn to the enigmatic Finn, Seb starts to question the true nature of the challenges they must undergo. The deeper into the programme the boys get, the more disturbing the assessments become, until it’s clear there may be no escape…

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Homophobia & outing mentioned
  • Alcohol consumption & drug use mentioned
  • Overdose mentioned
  • Emesis
  • Animal death

Swept Away by Beth O’Leary

Lexi is looking for no-strings-attached fun with a stranger. She deserves one night for herself, doesn’t she? Zeke is looking for love. But for one night with a woman like Lexi, he’ll break his rules… Sparks fly at the pub, one passionate kiss leads to another and they end up stumbling home to the marina together. The next morning, hungover and shaken by an amazing night together, Lexi is more than ready for Zeke to leave. There’s just one small problem . . . the houseboat they stayed on has been swept out to sea. As their supplies start to run dangerously low, and the… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Parental abandonment recounted
  • Parental infidelity recounted
  • Minor physical injuries (knife wound. head trauma)
  • Death of a parent recounted
  • Lost at sea with threat of sinking and food & water scarcity (theme, on-page)

This Book Made Me Think of You by Libby Page

When Tilly Nightingale receives a call telling her there’s a birthday gift from her fiancé waiting for her at her local bookshop, it couldn’t come as more of a shock. Partly because she can’t remember the last time she read a book for pleasure. Mainly because Joe died five months ago… The gift is simple – twelve books from Joe, one for each month, to help her turn the page on her first year without him. Tilly sets out on a series of reading-inspired adventures that take her around the world. But as she begins to vlog her journey, her story becomes more than her own. With help… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Grief & loss depiction (theme)
  • Death of a father from a heart attack
  • Death of a husband from cancer recounted

Stormfire by Christine Monson

Abducted on her way to boarding school, a terrified Catherine Enderly was brought from England to the coast of Ireland, the prisoner of the angry and powerful young Sean Culhane—a man sworn to vengeance against her family. Frightened but defiant, the young countess met her captor with a strength that belied her fragile loveliness. But even as Sean vowed to have his revenge on Catherine, with each encounter he became more attracted to her. Her fiery innocence was a seduction that lured the passions of long smouldering hostility into a blazing inferno of desire… Read more,

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Rape & gang-rape
  • Forced starvation
  • Miscarriage
  • Death of a mother
  • Gun & knife violence
  • Physical assault
  • Whipping
  • Poisoning
  • Kidnapping & captivity
  • Napoleonic War & colonialization

The Island Home by Libby Page

Lorna’s world is small but safe. She loves her daughter, and the two of them is all that matters. But after nearly twenty years, she and Ella are suddenly leaving London for the Isle of Kip, the tiny remote Scottish island where Lorna grew up. Alice’s world is tiny but full. She loves the community on Kip, her yoga classes drawing women across the tiny island together. Now Lorna’s arrival might help their family finally mend itself – even if forgiveness means returning to the past… So with two decades, hundreds of miles and a lifetime’s worth of secrets between Lorna and the island, can coming home mean starting again?

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Child abuse
  • Emotional abuse & gaslighting
  • Hypothermia
  • Cancer
  • Near-drowning incident

The Vintage Shop of Second Chances by Libby Page

Among the cobbled streets of the Somerset town of Frome, Lou is embarking on the start of something new. After the death of her beloved mother, she takes a deep breath into the unknown and is opening her own vintage clothes shop. In upstate New York, Donna has just found out some news about her family which has called into question her whole upbringing. The only clue she has to unlock her past is a picture of a yellow dress, and the fact it is currently on display in a shop in England. For Maggy, she is facing life as a 70-something divorcee and while she got the house, she… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Divorce recounted (protagonist)

Do Not Disturb by Claire Douglas

After what happened in London, Kirsty needs a fresh start with her family. And running a guesthouse in the Welsh mountains sounds idyllic. But then their first guest arrives. Selena is the last person Kirsty wants to see. It’s 17 years since she tore everything apart. Why has she chosen now to walk back into Kirsty’s life? Is Selena running from something too? Or is there an even darker reason for her visit?

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Child abuse
  • Infidelity mentioned
  • Attempted suicide & mentions of depression
  • Chronic illness
  • Blackmail mentioned