Category Archives: Science Fiction

Unwind by Neal Shusterman

Unwind by Neal Shusterman

The Second Civil War was fought over reproductive rights. The chilling resolution: Life is inviolable from the moment of conception until age thirteen. Between the ages of thirteen and eighteen, however, parents can have their child “unwound,” whereby all of the child’s organs are transplanted into different donors, so life doesn’t technically end. Connor is too difficult for his parents to control. Risa, a ward of the state, is not enough to be kept alive. And Lev is a tithe, a child conceived and raised to be unwound. Together, they may have a chance to escape and to survive. 

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Child & infant abandonment
  • Self-sacrificial suicide mentioned
  • Childbirth mentioned
  • Sanctioned murder (central theme)
  • Gun violence, specifically tranquilisers

Paper Girls Volume 1 by Brian K. Vaughan

Paper Girls Volume 1 by Brian K. Vaughan

Paper Girls Volume 1 by Brian K. Vaughan

SAGA writer BRIAN K. VAUGHAN launches a brand-new ONGOING SERIES with superstar Wonder Woman artist CLIFF CHIANG! In the early hours after Halloween of 1988, four 12-year-old newspaper delivery girls uncover the most important story of all time.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Queermisia & queermisic slurs
  • Bury Your Gays trope
  • Alcoholism
  • Attempted suicide
  • Blood depiction
  • Kidnapping mentioned

Dreamfall by Amy Plum

Dreamfall by Amy Plum

Dreamfall by Amy Plum

Cata Cordova suffers from such debilitating insomnia that she agreed to take part in an experimental new procedure. She thought things couldn’t get any worse…but she was terribly wrong.

Soon after the experiment begins, there’s a malfunction with the lab equipment, and Cata and six other teen patients are plunged into a shared dreamworld with no memory of how they got there. Even worse, they come to the chilling realization that they are trapped in a place where their worst nightmares have come to life. Hunted by creatures from their darkest imaginations and tormented by secrets they’d rather keep buried, Cata and the others will be forced to band together to face their biggest fears. And if they can’t find a way to defeat their dreams, they will never wake up.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Mental health stigmatization
  • Child abuse
  • Domestic violence
  • Obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD)
  • Depression
  • Narcolepsy
  • Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)
  • Eating disorders
  • Psychosis
  • Suicidal tendencies
  • Self sacrifice
  • Sleep disorders, specifically chronic insomnia
  • Nightmares
  • Medical experimentation
  • Coma
  • Scars
  • Gore depiction
  • Genocide
  • War themes

The Sixth Extinction by James Rollins 

The Sixth Extinction by James Rollins

A remote military research station broadcasts a frantic distress call that ends with a chilling message: Kill us all. When soldiers arrive to investigate, they discover everyone in the lab is dead—not just the scientists, but every living thing for fifty square miles is annihilated: every animal, plant, and insect, even bacteria. The land is completely sterile—and the blight is spreading.

To prevent the inevitable, Commander Gray Pierce and Sigma must decipher a threat that rises out of the distant past, a time when Antarctica was green and Earth’s life balanced on a knife-edge. Following clues from an ancient map rescued from the lost Library of Alexandria, Sigma will make a shocking discovery involving a prehistoric continent, and a new form of death buried under miles of ice. But is it already too late?

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Amputation
  • Murder
  • Fire
  • Animal death
  • Medical crisis of a pet

Faith: Greater Heights by Julie Murphy

Faith: Greater Heights by Julie Murphy

Faith Herbert can finally admit that she’s not a regular teen. Thankfully, her two best friends, Matt and Ches, are now in on her superhero secret. But after the chaos of her first semester, Faith just wants to end her senior year on a normal note—enjoying all the hallmarks of graduating high school—like prom! And, possibly, getting to attend college in the fall. A new teacher has taken over journalism class, and Faith is only occasionally reminded of the empty spot left by Colleen Bristow, the quiet nerd-turned-supervillain. That is, until Faith hears from Peter that other psiots have been… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Strangulation
  • Physical assault
  • Fire
  • Loss of autonomy (mind control)

Faith: Taking Flight by Julie Murphy

Faith: Taking Flight by Julie Murphy

Faith Herbert is a pretty regular teen. When she’s not hanging out with her two best friends, Matt and Ches, she’s volunteering at the local animal shelter or obsessing over the long-running teen drama The Grove. So far, her senior year has been spent trying to sort out her feelings for her maybe-crush Johnny and making plans to stay close to Grandma Lou after graduation. Of course, there’s also that small matter of recently discovering she can fly. When the fictional world of The Grove crashes into Faith’s reality as the show relocates to her town, she can’t believe it when… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Gun violence
  • Physical assault
  • Fire

Breathe by Sarah Crossan

Breathe by Sarah Crossan

The world has no air. If you want to survive, you pay to breathe. But what if you can’t? And what if you think everything could be different? Three teens will leave everything they know behind in Sarah Crossan’s gripping and original dystopian teen novel of danger, longing, and glimmering hope.

Ever since the Switch, when the oxygen levels plummeted and most of humanity died, the survivors have been protected in glass domes full of manufactured air. Protected . . . or trapped? Or controlled? Alina’s a revolutionary who believes we can save the environment. Quinn’s a Premium who’s never had to worry about having enough air. His best friend, Bea, is an Auxiliary who’s never worried about anything but having enough air. When the three cross paths, they will change everything.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Coerced alcohol consumption
  • Gun violence
  • Knife violence
  • Physical assault
  • Riot

The Maze Runner by James Dashner

The Maze Runner by James Dashner

The Maze Runner by James Dashner

When Thomas wakes up in the lift, the only thing he can remember is his name. He’s surrounded by strangers—boys whose memories are also gone. Outside the towering stone walls that surround the Glade is a limitless, ever-changing maze. It’s the only way out—and no one’s ever made it through alive. Then a girl arrives. The first girl ever. And the message she delivers is terrifying. Remember. Survive. Run.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Child abuse
  • Suicide
  • Murder
  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Gun violence
  • Animal attack

Tender Is the Flesh by Agustina Bazterrica

Tender Is the Flesh by Agustina Bazterrica

His wife has left him, his father is sinking into dementia, and Marcos tries not to think too hard about how he makes a living. After all, it happened so quickly. First, it was reported that an infectious virus has made all animal meat poisonous to humans. Then governments initiated the “Transition.” Now, eating human meat—“special meat”—is legal. Marcos tries to stick to numbers, consignments, processing.

Then one day he’s given a gift: a live specimen of the finest quality. Though he’s aware that any form of personal contact is forbidden on pain of death, little by little he starts to treat her like a human being. And soon, he becomes tortured by what has been lost—and what might still be saved.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Sexual assault
  • Estrangement
  • Grey-area cheating
  • Childbirth
  • Dead bodies & body parts
  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Physical injuries & wounds
  • Body horror
  • Cannibalism (theme)
  • Dismemberment
  • Involuntary pregnancy
  • Infertility themes
  • Death of a child
  • Death of a parent
  • Imprisonment
  • Torture
  • Animal cruelty & abuse

The Darkness Outside Us by Eliot Schrefer

The Darkness Outside Us by Eliot Schrefer

The Darkness Outside Us by Eliot Schrefer

Ambrose wakes up on the Coordinated Endeavor, with no memory of a launch. There’s more that doesn’t add up: Evidence indicates strangers have been on board, the ship’s operating system is voiced by his mother, and his handsome, brooding shipmate has barricaded himself away. But nothing will stop Ambrose from making his mission succeed—not when he’s rescuing his own sister.

In order to survive the ship’s secrets, Ambrose and Kodiak will need to work together and learn to trust one another… especially once they discover what they are truly up against. Love might be the only way to survive.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Depression & depressive episodes
  • Suicide
  • Suicidal ideation
  • Self-harm
  • Seizures
  • Graphic injuries
  • Cancer
  • Murder
  • Gaslighting