Category Archives: Science Fiction

Admission by Barry Jonsberg

Pandora Jones wakes in an infirmary – her body weak, her memory providing only flashes of horrific scenes of death. She soon discovers that her family has succumbed to a plague pandemic which almost wiped out humanity. Pan is one of the survivors who have been admitted to The School – a quarantined, heavily guarded survival-skills facility – to recover their strength, hone their skills and prepare for whatever comes next. Pandora’s skill is intuition, but how useful will it be outside the secure walls of The School? And what if it leads her to question where the truth lies…

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Suicide
  • Global pandemic (theme)

The Women Could Fly by Megan Giddings

Josephine Thomas has heard every conceivable theory about her mother’s disappearance. That she was kidnapped. Murdered. That she took on a new identity to start a new family. That she was a witch. This is the most worrying charge because in a world where witches are real, peculiar behavior raises suspicions and a woman–especially a Black woman–can find herself on trial for witchcraft. But fourteen years have passed since her mother’s disappearance, and now Jo is finally ready to let go of the past. Yet her future is in doubt. The State mandates that all women marry by… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Misogyny, homophobia & racism (theme)
  • Murder & disappearance of a mother
  • Animal death
  • Bullying

Young World by Soman Chainani

This year, best friends Sophie and Agatha are about to discover where all the lost children go: the fabled School for Good & Evil, where ordinary boys and girls are trained to be fairy tale heroes and villains. As the most beautiful girl in Gavaldon, Sophie has dreamed of being kidnapped into an enchanted world her whole life. With her pink dresses, glass slippers, and devotion to good deeds, she knows she’ll earn top marks at the School for Good and graduate a storybook princess. Meanwhile Agatha, with her shapeless black frocks, wicked pet cat, and dislike of nearly everyone, seems a natural fit for the School for Evil… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Adult-minor relationship and sexual assault of a minor by a teacher (17-year-old protagonist kissed by their 27-year-old teacher)
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Smoking & drug dealing mentioned
  • Murder & attempted murder by explosion and gun violence
  • Kidnapping
  • Animal attack (polar bear)

Worse Guy by Ruby Dixon

Crulden the Ruiner is the most dangerous gladiator in the galaxy. I’m his clone – equally ugly, equally dangerous, and just as feared. I’m also being held captive, since no one trusts a creature like me to be let loose. A curvy, determined human named Bee doesn’t think I’m a creature, though. In fact, she thinks I just need a guide. She’s got half the males on this planet eating out of her hand, and she’s confident she can do the same with me. The managing little female has no idea what she’s in for. I’m not some fool to be led around by my tail. But… the champion in me… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Sex slavery & sexual assault
  • Self-harm
  • Torture
  • Captivity recounted (on-page)

War Girls by Tochi Onyebuchi

The year is 2172. Climate change and nuclear disasters have rendered much of earth unlivable. Only the lucky ones have escaped to space colonies in the sky. In a war-torn Nigeria, battles are fought using flying, deadly mechs and soldiers are outfitted with bionic limbs and artificial organs meant to protect them from the harsh, radiation-heavy climate. Across the nation, as the years-long civil war wages on, survival becomes the only way of life. Two sisters, Onyii and Ify, dream of more. Their lives have been marked by violence and political unrest. Still, they dream of peace… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Suicide
  • Drug use
  • Blood & injury depiction, including mentions of amputation, loss of vision & eye trauma
  • Death of a child
  • Murder
  • Gun violence
  • Explosion (landmines)
  • Kidnapping
  • War themes & nuclear disaster recounted

Rebel Sisters by Tochi Onyebuchi

It’s been five years since the Biafran War ended. Ify is now nineteen and living where she’s always dreamed–the Space Colonies. She is a respected, high-ranking medical officer and has dedicated her life to helping refugees like herself rebuild in the Colonies. Back in the still devastated Nigeria, Uzo, a young synth, is helping an aid worker, Xifeng, recover images and details of the war held in the technology of destroyed androids. Uzo, Xifeng, and the rest of their team are working to preserve memories of the many lives lost, despite the government’s best efforts to eradicate… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Torture

Goliath by Tochi Onyebuchi

In the 2050s, Earth has begun to empty. Those with the means and the privilege have departed the great cities of the United States for the more comfortable confines of space colonies. Those left behind salvage what they can from the collapsing infrastructure. As they eke out an existence, their neighbourhoods are being cannibalized. Brick by brick, their houses are sent to the colonies, what was once a home now a quaint reminder for the colonists of the world that they wrecked. A primal biblical epic flung into the future, Goliath weaves together disparate narratives—a space… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Racism & racial slurs
  • Rape mentioned
  • Substance addiction
  • Suicide mentioned
  • Drug use & abuse
  • Blood & gore depiction, including dead bodies & emesis
  • Murder
  • Gun violence
  • Police brutality
  • Lynching mentioned
  • Kidnapping
  • Incarceration & prison riot

The Wood by Chelsea Bobulski

Winter didn’t ask to be the guardian of the wood, but when her dad inexplicably vanishes, she’s the one who must protect travellers who accidentally slip through its portals. The wood is poisoned, changing into something more sinister. Once brightly coloured leaves are now bubbling inky black. Vicious creatures that live in the shadows are becoming bolder, torturing lost travellers. Winter must then put her trust in Henry—a young man from eighteenth-century England who knows more than he should about the wood—in order to find the truth and, maybe, those they’ve lost.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Disappearance of a parent

End of Days by Susan Ee

After a daring escape from the angels, Penryn and Raffe are on the run. They’re both desperate to find a doctor who can reverse the twisted changes inflicted by the angels on Raffe and Penryn’s sister. As they set off in search of answers, a startling revelation about Raffe’s past unleashes dark forces that threaten them all. When the angels release an apocalyptic nightmare onto humans, both sides are set on a path toward war. As unlikely alliances form and strategies shift, who will emerge victorious? Forced to pick sides in the fight for control of the earthly realm, Raffe and Penryn must choose: Their own kind, or each other?

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Ableism & ableist language (on-page)
  • Disfigurmisia
  • Slavery
  • Parent with paranoid schizophrenia
  • Self-sacrifice
  • Graphic blood & injury depiction, including dead bodies, body horror, involuntary body modifications, medical experimentations, plague, eyeball trauma & loss of vision, and cannibalism
  • Torture & psychological torture (on-page), including mentions of being eaten & skinned alive
  • Murder & attempted murder
  • Physical assault
  • Gun & sword violence
  • Explosion
  • Whipping
  • Imprisonment, kidnapping & captivity
  • Building collapse recounted
  • Rebellion themes
  • Cults

You and Me on Repeat by Mary Shyne

Chris O’Brien has a genius plan: If he can share the perfect first kiss with his crush, Andy, then of course he’ll break free from the time loop that has him repeating graduation day over and over…and over. Alicia Ochoa thinks Chris’s plan is doomed. Valedictorian and a total nerd, she knows it’ll take more than a kiss to escape the loop they’re trapped in together. Besides, Chris may be a hopeless romantic, but Alicia doesn’t think he has a real shot with Andy. Once close friends, Alicia and Chris have history—lots of it. As they got older, the pair fell out after… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Death of a friend