Historical Fiction – Page 35 – Trigger Warning Database

The Black Lily by Juliette Cross

The Black Lily by Juliette Cross

Every day, the threat the Varis family poses to the humans they rule over grows stronger. Every minute that Arabelle spends doing chores for vain, entitled aristocrats, her resolve to overthrow the vampire monarchy increases. She is the leader of the underground resistance, The Black Lily. And she’s waited long enough. Now is the perfect time to ignite the rebellion. The plan? Attend the vampire prince’s blood ball. And kill him. Dagger in hand, Arabelle is caught off guard by the immediate spark she shares with Prince Marius. It doesn’t help that… Read more.

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Trigger & Content Warnings

Blood depiction & blood-letting
Death of a lover recounted

These Shallow Graves by Jennifer Donnelly

These Shallow Graves by Jennifer Donnelly

Jo Montfort is beautiful and rich, and soon—like all the girls in her class—she’ll graduate from finishing school and be married off to a wealthy bachelor. Which is the last thing she wants. Jo secretly dreams of becoming a writer—a newspaper reporter like the trailblazing Nellie Bly. Wild aspirations aside, Jo’s life seems perfect until tragedy strikes: her father is found dead. Charles Montfort accidentally shot himself while cleaning his revolver. One of New York City’s wealthiest men, he owned a newspaper and was partner in a massive shipping firm, and Jo knows he was far… Read more.

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Trigger and Content Warnings

Period-typical sexism & ableism
Slavery
Forced sex work
Suicide
Involuntary psychiatric hospitalisation
Murder of a father
Physical assault & kidnapping

Accidentally Compromising the Duke by Stacy Reid

Accidentally Compromising the Duke by Stacy Reid

England, 1817. Miss Adeline Hays is out of options. Determined to escape marriage to a repugnant earl, Adeline plans to deliberately allow herself to be caught in a compromising position at a house party with the much kinder man she’d hoped to marry. Instead, Adeline accidentally enters the wrong chamber and tumbles into the bed of the mad duke. Edmond Rochester, the duke of Wolverton, is seeking a wife to care for his two daughters. A young lady of sensibilities, accomplishment, and most importantly, one who he is not attracted to—a complete opposite…. Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

Period-typical sexism & ableism
Attempted sexual assault mentioned
Unplanned pregnancy mentioned
Grief & loss depiction
Death of a mother mentioned
Death of a wife in childbirth & stillborn son mentioned

The Abstainer by Ian McGuire

The Abstainer by Ian McGuire

Stephen Doyle, an Irish-American veteran of the Civil War, arrives in Manchester from New York with a thirst for blood. He has joined the Fenians, a secret society intent on ending British rule in Ireland by any means necessary. Head Constable James O’Connor has fled grief and drink in Dublin for a sober start in Manchester, and connections with his fellow Irishmen are proving to be particularly advantageous in spying on Fenian activity. When a long-lost nephew returns from America and arrives on O’Connor’s doorstep looking for work, O’Connor cannot foresee the way his… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Child abuse
Murder

The Butchers by Ruth Gilligan

The Butchers by Ruth Gilligan

A photograph is hung on a gallery wall for the very first time since it was taken two decades before. It shows a slaughterhouse in rural Ireland, a painting of the Virgin Mary on the wall, a meat hook suspended from the ceiling – and, from its sharp point, the lifeless body of a man hanging by his feet. The story of who he is and how he got there casts back into Irish folklore, of widows cursing the land and of the men who slaughter its cattle by hand. But modern Ireland is distrustful of ancient traditions, and as the BSE crisis in England presents get-rich opportunities in Ireland, few care… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Blood & gore depiction
Knife violence

The Stationery Shop by Marjan Kamali

The Stationery Shop by Marjan Kamali

Roya, a dreamy, idealistic teenager living amid the political upheaval of 1953 Tehran, finds a literary oasis in kindly Mr Fakhri’s neighbourhood stationery shop, stocked with books and pens and bottles of jewel-coloured ink. Then Mr Fakhri, with a keen instinct for a budding romance, introduces Roya to his other favourite customer—handsome Bahman, who has a burning passion for justice and a love for Rumi’s poetry—and she loses her heart at once. Their romance blossoms and the little stationery shop remains their favourite place in all of Tehran… Read more.

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Trigger & Content Warnings

Self-induced abortion mentioned

The Mercies by Kiran Millwood Hargrave

The Mercies by Kiran Millwood Hargrave

Finnmark, Norway, 1617. Twenty-year-old Maren Bergensdatter stands on the craggy coast, watching the sea break into a sudden and reckless storm. Forty fishermen, including her brother and father, are drowned and left broken on the rocks below. With the menfolk wiped out, the women of the tiny Northern town of Vardø must fend for themselves. Three years later, a sinister figure arrives. Absalom Cornet comes from Scotland, where he burned witches in the northern isles. He brings with him his young… Read more.

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Trigger & Content Warnings

Racism
Misogyny
Persecution for witchcraft
Martial rape & sexual assault
Arranged marriage
Miscarriage
Murder
Immolation
Drowning
Torture

A Clash of Steel by CB Lee

A Clash of Steel: A Treasure Island Remix by C.B. Lee

1826. The sun is setting on the golden age of piracy, and the legendary Dragon Fleet, the scourge of the South China Sea, is no more. Its ruthless leader, a woman known only as the Head of the Dragon, is now only a story, like the ones Xiang has grown up with all her life. She desperately wants to prove her worth, especially to her mother, a shrewd businesswoman who never seems to have enough time for Xiang. Her father is also only a story, dead at sea before Xiang was born. Her single memento of him is a pendant she always wears, a simple but plain piece of gold jewellery… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Alcohol consumption
Blood & injury depiction
Death of a parent
Murder
Gun & sword violence
Physical assault

A Constellation of Vital Phenomena by Anthony Marra

A Constellation of Vital Phenomena by Anthony Marra

In the final days of December 2004, in a small rural village in Chechnya, eight-year-old Havaa hides in the woods when her father is abducted by Russian forces. Fearing for her life, she flees with their neighbour Akhmed—a failed physician—to the bombed-out hospital, where Sonja, the one remaining doctor, treats a steady stream of wounded rebels and refugees and mourns her missing sister. Over the course of five dramatic days, Akhmed and Sonja reach back into their pasts to unravel the intricate mystery that unexpectedly binds them and decides their fate….

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Trigger & Content Warnings

Attempted rape
Substance addiction
Murder
Torture
War themes

Washington Black by Esi Edugyan

Washington Black by Esi Edugyan

When his master’s eccentric brother chooses him to be his manservant, Wash is terrified of the cruelties he is certain await him. But Christopher Wilde, or “Titch,” is a naturalist, explorer, scientist, inventor, and abolitionist. He initiates Wash into a world where a flying machine can carry a man across the sky; where two people, separated by an impossible divide, might begin to see each other as human; and where a boy born in chains can embrace a life of dignity and meaning. But when a man is killed and a bounty is placed on Wash’s head, Titch abandons everything to save him… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Slavery
Racism & racial slurs
Body mutilation & disfigurement
Torture mentioned