Deadline by Mira Grant

Deadline by Mira Grant

Deadline by Mira Grant

Shaun Mason is a man without a mission. Not even running the news organization he built with his sister has the same urgency as it used to. Playing with dead things just doesn’t seem as fun when you’ve lost as much as he has. But when a CDC researcher fakes her own death and appears on his doorstep with a ravenous pack of zombies in tow, Shaun has a newfound interest in life.

Because she brings news-he may have put down the monster who attacked them, but the conspiracy is far from dead… Read more.

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Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Self-sacrifice
  • Hallucinations
  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a sister
  • Death of a friend
  • Death of a spouse
  • Gun violence
  • Animal testing
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Never Have I Ever by Isabel Yap 

Never Have I Ever by Isabel Yap

“Am I dead?” Mebuyen sighs. She was hoping the girl would not ask. Spells and stories, urban legends and immigrant tales: the magic in Isabel Yap’s debut collection jumps right off the page, from the joy in her new novella, ‘A Spell for Foolish Hearts’ to the terrifying tension of the urban legend ‘Have You Heard the One About Anamaria Marquez’.

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Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Homomisia
  • Deadnaming
  • Misgendering
  • Rape
  • Statutory rape
  • Suicide
  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Murder
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Riley’s Ghost by John David Anderson

Riley’s Ghost by John David Anderson

Riley Flynn is alone. It feels like she’s been on her own since sixth grade, when her best friend, Emily, ditched her for the cool girls. Girls who don’t like Riley. Girls who decide one day to lock her in the science closet after hours, after everyone else has gone home.

When Riley is finally able to escape, however, she finds that her horror story is only just beginning. All the school doors are locked, the windows won’t budge, the phones are dead, and the lights aren’t working. Through halls lit only by the narrow beam of her flashlight, Riley roams the building, seeking a way out, an answer, an explanation. And as she does, she starts to suspect she isn’t alone after all… Read more.

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Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Bullying
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The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson

It is the story of four seekers who arrive at a notoriously unfriendly pile called Hill House: Dr. Montague, an occult scholar looking for solid evidence of a “haunting”; Theodora, the lighthearted assistant; Eleanor, a friendless, fragile young woman well acquainted with poltergeists; and Luke, the future heir of Hill House. At first, their stay seems destined to be merely a spooky encounter with inexplicable phenomena. But Hill House is gathering its powers—and soon it will choose one of them to make its own.

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Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Suicide by hanging
  • Suicide by car collision
  • Suicidal ideation
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Death of a mother, off-page
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The Companion by Katie Alender

The other orphans say Margot is lucky. Lucky to survive the horrible accident that killed her family. Lucky to have her own room because she wakes up screaming every night. And finally, lucky to be chosen by a prestigious family to live at their remote country estate. But it wasn’t luck that made the Suttons rescue Margot from her bleak existence at the group home. Margot was hand-picked to be a companion to their silent, mysterious daughter, Agatha. At first, helping with Agatha, and getting to know her handsome older brother, seems much better than the… Read more.

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Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Graphic child abuse
  • Drugging
  • Munchausen by Proxy (theme)
  • Nightmares
  • Catatonia
  • Parent with substance addiction mentioned
  • Non-consensual medical treatment and medication
  • Needles & syringes
  • Physical illness & injury, including graphic emesis & seizure
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a mother, father, and sisters in a car accident
  • Death of a sister
  • Murder & attempted murder
  • Drowning
  • Death of a pet cat recounted

The Stand by Stephen King

The Stand by Stephen King

A patient escapes from a biological testing facility, unknowingly carrying a deadly weapon: a mutated strain of super-flu that will wipe out 99 percent of the world’s population within a few weeks. Those who remain are scared, bewildered, and in need of a leader. Two emerge—Mother Abagail, the benevolent 108-year-old woman who urges them to build a peaceful community in Boulder, Colorado; and Randall Flagg, the nefarious “Dark Man,” who delights in chaos and violence. As the dark man and the peaceful woman gather power, the survivors will have to choose between them—and ultimately decide the fate of all humanity.

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Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Ableist language
  • Racism & racial slurs
  • Rape
  • Suicide
  • Abortion discussed
  • Dead bodies
  • Murder
  • Graphic gun violence
  • Suffocation
  • White supremacy & the KKK mentioned

Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury

Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury

For those who still dream and remember, for those yet to experience the hypnotic power of its dark poetry, step inside. The show is about to begin. Cooger & Dark’s Pandemonium Shadow Show has come to Green Town, Illinois, to destroy every life touched by its strange and sinister mystery. The carnival rolls in sometime after midnight, ushering in Halloween a week early. A calliope’s shrill siren song beckons to all with a seductive promise of dreams and youth regained. Two boys will discover the secret of its smoke, mazes, and mirrors; two friends who will soon know all too well the heavy cost of wishes…and the stuff of nightmares.

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Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Kidnapping
  • Stalking

Hotel Ruby by Suzanne Young

Hotel Ruby by Suzanne Young

When Audrey Casella arrives for an unplanned stay at the grand Hotel Ruby, she’s grateful for the detour. Just months after their mother’s death, Audrey and her brother, Daniel, are on their way to live with their grandmother, dumped on the doorstep of a DNA-matched stranger because their father is drowning in his grief.

Audrey and her family only plan to stay the night, but life in the Ruby can be intoxicating, extending their stay as it provides endless distractions—including handsome guest Elias Lange, who sends Audrey’s pulse racing. However, the hotel proves to be as strange as it is beautiful. Nightly fancy affairs in the ballroom are invitation-only… Read more.

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Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Suicide
  • Death by stroke
  • Car accident
  • Fire

I’m Thinking of Ending Things by Iain Reid

I’m Thinking of Ending Things by Iain Reid

I’m thinking of ending things. Once this thought arrives, it stays. It sticks. It lingers. It’s always there. Always.

Jake once said, “Sometimes a thought is closer to truth, to reality, than an action. You can say anything, you can do anything, but you can’t fake a thought.”

And here’s what I’m thinking: I don’t want to be here.

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Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Graphic self-harm
  • Suicide, on-page
  • Nightmares
  • Stalking

The Library Book by Susan Orlean

The Library Book by Susan Orlean

On the morning of April 29, 1986, a fire alarm sounded in the Los Angeles Public Library. As the moments passed, the patrons and staff who had been cleared out of the building realized this was not the usual fire alarm. As one fireman recounted, “Once that first stack got going, it was ‘Goodbye, Charlie.’” The fire was disastrous: it reached 2000 degrees and burned for more than seven hours. By the time it was extinguished, it had consumed four hundred thousand books and damaged seven hundred thousand more. Investigators descended on the scene, but more than thirty years later, the mystery remains: Did someone purposefully set fire to the library—and if so, who?

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Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Homomisia
  • Death from HIV/AIDS
  • Fire & arson