Category Archives: Genres

Fairy Tale by Stephen King

Fairy Tale by Stephen King

Charlie Reade looks like a regular high school kid, great at baseball and football, a decent student. But he carries a heavy load. His mom was killed in a hit-and-run accident when he was ten, and grief drove his dad to drink. Charlie learned how to take care of himself—and his dad. Then, when Charlie is seventeen, he meets Howard Bowditch, a recluse with a big dog in a big house at the top of a big hill. In the backyard is a locked shed from which strange sounds emerge, as if some creature is trying to escape. When Mr Bowditch dies, he leaves Charlie the house, a massive amount of gold, a cassette tape telling a story that is… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Incest
  • Alcoholism
  • Cancer
  • Death of a parent
  • Car accident
  • Bullying

Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt

Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt

After Tova Sullivan’s husband died, she began working the night shift at the Sowell Bay Aquarium, mopping floors and tidying up. Keeping busy has always helped her cope, which she’s been doing since her eighteen-year-old son, Erik, mysteriously vanished on a boat in Puget Sound over thirty years ago. Tova becomes acquainted with curmudgeonly Marcellus, a giant Pacific octopus living at the aquarium. Marcellus knows more than anyone can imagine but wouldn’t dream of lifting one of his eight arms for his human captors–until he forms a remarkable friendship with… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Parental abandonment
  • Drug use, off-page
  • Death of a spouse from cancer
  • Death of a child from drowning

The Long Way Home by Louise Penny

The Long Way Home by Louise Penny

Happily retired in the village of Three Pines, Armand Gamache, former Chief Inspector of Homicide with the Sûreté du Québec, has found a peace he’d only imagined possible. On warm summer mornings, he sits on a bench holding a small book, The Balm in Gilead, in his large hands. “There is a balm in Gilead,” his neighbour Clara Morrow reads from the dust jacket, “to make the wounded whole.” While Gamache doesn’t talk about his wounds and his balm, Clara tells him about hers. Peter, her artist husband, has failed to come home. Failed to show up as promised on… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Blood depiction
  • Death of a parent
  • Murder
  • Car accident

How the Light Gets In by Louise Penny

How the Light Gets In by Louise Penny

Christmas is approaching, and in Québec it’s a time of dazzling snowfalls, bright lights, and gatherings with friends in front of blazing hearths. But shadows are falling on the usually festive season for Chief Inspector Armand Gamache. Most of his best agents have left the Homicide Department, his old friend and lieutenant Jean-Guy Beauvoir hasn’t spoken to him in months, and hostile forces are lining up against him. When Gamache receives a message from Myrna Landers that a longtime friend has failed to arrive for Christmas in the village of Three Pines, he welcomes the chance to get away from the city. Mystified by Myrna’s reluctance… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Suicide & suicidal ideation
  • Drug abuse
  • Infertility
  • Physical injury
  • Murder
  • Gun violence

The Hangman by Louise Penny

The Hangman by Louise Penny

On a cold November morning, a jogger runs through the woods near the peaceful Quebec village of Three Pines. On his run, he finds a dead man hanging from a tree. The man was a guest at the local Inn and Spa. The man might have been looking for peace and quiet, but something else found him. Something horrible. Did the man take his own life? Or was he murdered? Chief Inspector Armand Gamache is called to the crime scene. As Gamache follows the trail of clues, he opens a door into the past. And he learns the true reason why the man came to Three Pines. A quick and easy read for people on the go.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Child abuse
  • Suicide & suicidal ideation
  • Death of a child
  • Murder
  • Car accident

A Fatal Grace by Louise Penny

A Fatal Grace by Louise Penny

Welcome to winter in Three Pines, a picturesque village in Quebec, where the villagers are preparing for a traditional country Christmas, and someone is preparing for murder. No one liked CC de Poitiers. Not her quiet husband, not her spineless lover, not her pathetic daughter—and certainly none of the residents of Three Pines. CC de Poitiers managed to alienate everyone, right up until the moment of her death. When Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, of the Sûreté du Québec, is called to investigate, he quickly realizes he’s dealing with someone quite extra… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Fatmisia & body-shaming
  • Forced institutionalisation
  • Eating disorder
  • Emesis
  • Death of a parent
  • Murder

The Cruelest Month by Louise Penny

The Cruelest Month by Louise Penny

Welcome to Three Pines, where the cruellest month is about to deliver on its threat. It’s spring in the tiny, forgotten village; buds are on the trees and the first flowers are struggling through the newly thawed earth. But not everything is meant to return to life. When some villagers decide to celebrate Easter with a séance at the Old Hadley House, they are hoping to rid the town of its evil—until one of their party dies of fright. Was this a natural death, or was the victim somehow helped along?

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Racism
  • Fatmisia
  • Cancer
  • Murder
  • Animal death

Bury Your Dead by Louise Penny

Bury Your Dead by Louise Penny

It is Winter Carnival in Quebec City, bitterly cold and surpassingly beautiful. Chief Inspector Armand Gamache has come not to join the revels but to recover from an investigation gone hauntingly wrong. But violent death is inescapable, even in the apparent sanctuary of the Literary and Historical Society— where an obsessive historian’s quest for the remains of the founder of Quebec, Samuel de Champlain, ends in murder. Could a secret buried with Champlain for nearly 400 years be so dreadful that someone would kill to protect it? Although he is supposed to be… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Attempted suicide
  • Murder
  • Gun violence
  • Kidnapping

The Brutal Telling by Louise Penny

The Brutal Telling by Louise Penny

Chaos is coming, old son. With those words the peace of Three Pines is shattered. As families prepare to head back to the city and children say goodbye to summer, a stranger is found murdered in the village bistro and antiques store. Once again, Chief Inspector Gamache and his team are called in to strip back layers of lies, exposing both treasures and rancid secrets buried in the wilderness. No one admits to knowing the murdered man, but as secrets are revealed, chaos begins to close in on the beloved bistro owner, Olivier. How did he make such a spectacular success of his… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Racism
  • Homomisia
  • Toxic friendship
  • Murder
  • Animal cruelty

The Beautiful Mystery by Louise Penny

The Beautiful Mystery by Louise Penny

No outsiders are ever admitted to the monastery of Saint-Gilbert-Entre-les-Loups, hidden deep in the wilderness of Quebec, where two dozen cloistered monks live in peace and prayer. They grow vegetables, they tend chickens, they make chocolate. And they sing. Ironically, for a community that has taken a vow of silence, the monks have become world-famous for their glorious voices, raised in ancient chants whose effect on both singer and listener is so profound it is known as “the beautiful mystery.” But when the renowned choir director is murdered, the lock on the… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Homomisia
  • Paedophilia
  • Substance addiction
  • Drug use & abuse
  • Police brutality
  • Gun violence