Category Archives: Entries

The Dead Take the A Train by Cassandra Khaw and Richard Kadrey

Julie Crews is a coked-up, burnt-out thirty-something who packs a lot of magic into her small body. She’s been trying to establish herself in the NYC magic scene, and she’ll work the most gruesome gigs to claw her way to the top. Julie is desperate for a quick career boost to break the dead-end grind, but her pleas draw the attention of an eldritch god who is hungry for revenge. Her power grab sets off a deadly chain of events that puts her closest friends – and the entire world – directly in the path of annihilation.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Intimate partner violence, off-page
  • Self-harm
  • Murder
  • Gun violence
  • Torture, off-page
  • Loss of autonomy (possession)

The Sun Sets in Singapore by Kehinde Fadipe

Dara, a workaholic lawyer from the UK, is on the brink of partnership at her firm. Estranged from her mother, and perpetually uncomfortable around her hypercompetitive colleagues, her insecurities intensify exponentially when Lani, a new hire from Geneva (and a fellow British Nigerian), is assigned to work on what should have been her career-making case. Pitted against each other by their boss, Dara can’t help but see Lani as a threat: a privileged man poised to take her place. Amaka, a sharp-tongued banker from Nigeria, is in the midst of a painful family dispute. Thousands of miles away from home, she’s doing her… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Classism
  • Parental abandonment
  • Infertility

A Dawn of Onyx by Kate Golden

Arwen Valondale never expected to be the brave one, offering her life to save her brother’s. Now she’s been taken prisoner by the most dangerous kingdom on the continent, and made to use her rare magical abilities to heal the soldiers of the vicious Onyx King. Arwen knows better than to face the ancient, wicked woods that surround the castle on her own, which means working with a fellow prisoner might be her only path to freedom. Unfortunately, he’s as infuriating as he is cunning—and seems to take twisted pleasure in playing on Arwen’s deepest fears. But here in… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Attempted sexual assault
  • Sexual harassment
  • Emotional and physical child abuse by a step-parent mentioned
  • Blood, gore and injury depiction
  • Parent with chronic health condition
  • Death of a mother
  • Kidnapping
  • War themes

After the Forest by Kell Woods

1650: The Black Forest, Wurttemberg. Fifteen years after the witch in the gingerbread house, Greta and Hans are struggling to get by. Their mother and stepmother are long dead, Hans is deeply in debt from gambling, and the countryside lies in ruin, its people recovering in the aftermath of a brutal war. Greta has a secret, the witch’s grimoire, secreted away and whispering in her ear, and the recipe inside that makes the most sinfully delicious – and addictive – gingerbread. As long as she can bake, Greta can keep her small family afloat. But in a village full of superstition, Greta and her intoxicating… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Animal cruelty (baiting)

Lore Olympus, Volume 5 by Rachel Smythe

An ingenious take on the Greek Pantheon, Lore Olympus is a modern update on the story of Hades and Persephone. Follow the propulsive love story of two Greek gods, told with lavish artwork and contemporary sensibilities.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Alcohol consumption
  • Smoking
  • Anxiety & depression
  • Murder
  • Blackmail

10 Things That Never Happened by Alexis Hall

Sam Becker loves―or, okay, likes―his job. Sure, managing a bed and bath retailer isn’t exactly glamorous, but it’s good work and he gets on well with the band of misfits who keep the store running. He could see himself being content here for the long haul. Too bad, then, that the owner is an infuriating git. Jonathan Forest should never have hired Sam. It was a sentimental decision, and Jonathan didn’t get where he is by following his heart. Determined to set things right, Jonathan orders Sam down to London for a difficult talk, only for a panicking Sam to trip, bump.. Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Hospitalisation for concussion, on-page
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of parent in a car accident recounted

Reasonable Adults by Robin Lefler

The morning after a humiliating post-breakup social media post (#sponsoredbywine), Kate Rigsby learns she’s lost her marketing job along with her almost-fiancé. Worse, she realizes how little she truly cared about either. Craving a reset, Kate flees the big-city life she spent many years building—and almost as many doubting—to take a temporary gig at Treetops, a swanky, off-the-grid creative retreat in Muskoka, complete with meditation circles, deluxe spa, and artisanal cocktails. At least, that’s what the brochure promises. The reality is a struggling resort that’s struck in the… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Sexual assault, on-page

A Holly Jolly Ever After by Julie Murphy and Sierra Simone

Kallum Lieberman is an ex-boyband member now known exclusively for hooking up with bridesmaids at weddings. He’s even considered a lucky he’s such a fail-safe one-before-you-find-the-one that people have started seeking him out. Winnie Baker’s reputation is the exact she married her childhood sweetheart and became a star of many popular – although very reserved – Hope Channel movies, while still avoiding the downfalls of adolescent fame. Except neither of them want these lives anymore. And what better way to change their reputations and bring them both back into the spotlight than to star in a steamier… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Infidelity (cheating ex-partner)
  • Narcolepsy
  • Unplanned pregnancy and miscarriage scare
  • Fire and destruction of property

Friends Don’t Fall in Love by Erin Hahn

Lorelai Jones had it all: a thriving country music career and a superstar fiancé. Then she played one teenie tiny protest song at a concert and ruined her entire future, including her impending celebrity marriage. But five years later, she refuses to be done with her dreams and calls up the one person who stuck by her, her dear friend and her former fiancé’s co-writer and bandmate, Craig. Craig Boseman’s held a torch for Lorelai for years, but even he knows the backup bass player never gets the girl. Things are different now, though. Craig owns his own Indie record label and his songwriting… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Celiac Disease (protagonist)
  • School shooting mentioned

Love Interest by Clare Gilmore

Casey Maitland has always preferred the reliability of numbers, despite growing up the daughter of two artistic souls. Now a twenty-four-year-old finance expert working in Manhattan, Casey wonders if the project manager opening at her company – magazine powerhouse LC Publications – is a sign from the universe to pursue a career with a little more sparkle. That is, until she’s passed over for the job in favour of the board chairman’s son. Alex Harrison is handsome, Harvard-educated, and enigmatic. Everybody loves him – except for Casey. But when the two are thrown on the same project, they both have something… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Infidelity mentioned (secondary characters)
  • Death of a mother from lung and ovarian cancer