Category Archives: Young Adult

The Rose Bargain by Sasha Peyton Smith

Every citizen of England is granted one bargain from their immortal fae queen. High society girls are expected to bargain for qualities that will win them suitors: a rare talent for piano in exchange for one’s happiest childhood memory. A perfect smile for one’s ability to taste. But Ivy Benton’s debut season arrives with a shocking twist: a competition to secure the heart of the Queen’s fae son, Prince Bram. A prize that could save Ivy’s family from ruin… and free her sister from the bargain that destroyed her. Yet every glittering fae deal has a rotting heart—and at the center of this contest is a plot that could destroy everything…

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Physical & verbal child abuse mentioned (secondary character)
  • Memory loss
  • Suicide (implied)
  • Self-injury & loss of limb/appendages for magic
  • Alcohol consumption & mentions of smoking
  • Blood & injury depiction
  • Emesis
  • Murder by stabbing
  • Drowning mentioned
  • Animal death (swan)
  • Bullying mentioned (secondary character)

Under the Same Stars by Libba Bray

It was said that if you write to the Bridegroom’s Oak, the love of your life will answer back. Now, the tree is giving up its secrets at last. In 1940s Germany, Sophie is excited to discover a message waiting for her in the Bridegroom’s Oak from a mysterious suitor. Meanwhile, her best friend, Hanna, is sending messages too—but not to find love. As World War II unfolds in their small town of Kleinwald, the oak may hold the key to resistance against the Nazis. In 1980s West Germany, American teen transplant Jenny feels suffocated by her strict parents and is struggling to fit in. Until she finds herself falling for Lena, a punk… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Period-typical racism, homophobia & antisemitism

(S)Kin by Ibi Zoboi

Fifteen-year-old Marisol is the daughter of a soucouyant. Every new moon, she sheds her skin like the many women before her, shifting into a fireball witch who must fly into the night and slowly sip from the lives of others to sustain her own. But Brooklyn is no place for fireball witches with all its bright lights, shut windows, and bolt-locked doors.… While Marisol hoped they would leave their old traditions behind when they emigrated from the islands, she knows this will never happen while she remains ensnared by the one person who keeps her chained to her… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Misogyny & sexual harassment
  • Infidelity discussed
  • Alcohol consumption mentioned (secondary character)
  • Body horror (on-page, detailed)

More Than This by Krystal Marquis

Newly engaged Ruby Tremaine is eagerly planning her wedding to the love of her life when a nasty rumor threatens her reputation and her marriage. Olivia Davenport has committed to the social justice cause and secretly hopes she’ll be reunited with dashing lawyer Washington DeWight—until her parents decide she’s to marry someone else. Amy-Rose Shepherd is making her lifelong wish of owning a salon come true, but when an incident forces her to return to Freeport Manor, she’s back in the path of John Davenport, who still holds her heart. Helen Davenport… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Period-typical racism, misogyny & classism
  • Slavery mentioned
  • Sexual harassment
  • Police brutality

Break to You by Neal Shusterman, Debra Young and Michelle Knowlden

Adriana knows that if she can manage to keep her head down for the next seven months, she might be able to get through her sentence in the Compass juvenile detention center. Thankfully, she’s allowed to keep her journal, where she writes down her most private thoughts when her feelings get too big. Until the day she opens her journal and discovers that her thoughts are no longer so private. Someone has read her writings—and has written back. A boy who lives on the other side of the gender-divided detention center. A boy who sparks a fire in her to write back… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Hospitalisation
  • Death of a parent
  • Poisoning
  • Incarceration (juvenile detention)
  • Bullying

The One That Got Away with Murder by Trish Lundy

Robbie and Trevor Cresmont have a body count—the killer kind. Handsome and privileged, the Crestmont brothers’ have enough wealth to ensure they’ll never be found guilty of any wrongdoing, even if all of Happy Valley believes they’re behind the deaths of their ex-girlfriends. First there was soccer star Victoria Moreno, Robbie’s ex, who mysteriously drowned at the family lake house. Then, a year later, Trevor’s girlfriend died of a suspicious overdose. But the Crestmonts aren’t the only ones with secrets. Lauren O’Brian might be the new girl at school, but she’s never been… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Sexual assault
  • Murder

The Champions by Kara Thomas

It was the deaths of five cheerleaders that made the town of Sunnybrook infamous. Eleven years later, the girls’ killer has been brought to justice, and the town just wants to move on. By the time Hadley moves to Sunnybrook, though, the locals are more interested in the Tigers, the high school’s championship-winning football team. The Tigers are Sunnybrook’s homegrown heroes–something positive in a town with so much darkness in its past. Hadley could care less about football, but shortly after she gets assigned to cover the team’s latest championship bid for the school newspaper, one of the Tigers is poison… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Sexual assault & gang rape
  • Domestic violence
  • Infidelity
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Drugging
  • Hospitalisation
  • Emesis
  • Gun violence
  • Bullying & hazing mentioned

Girls Who Burn by M.K. Pagano

When eighteen-year-old Addie’s sister is found dead at the bottom of a ravine, it’s officially ruled an accident, but Addie doesn’t buy it. The problem is, Addie has no evidence because when her sister died, she was a little distracted with Seth Montgomery, the boy next door Addie’s always loved to hate. She believes the murderer is Thatcher Montgomery, Seth’s cousin. He always had a thing for her sister, and Addie caught them arguing shortly before her death. But, one year later, Thatcher is found dead at the bottom of the same ravine and Addie is forced to admit she was wrong… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Slut-shaming
  • Infidelity
  • Child sexual abuse mentioned

Stay Dead by April Henry

In the aftermath of a car accident that claimed the life of her senator father, sixteen-year-old Milan finds herself adrift, expelled from her third boarding school. Milan’s mother, who has assumed the senate seat, diverts her private plane to pick up her daughter. But on their way home, a bomb rips off a wing and the plane crashes in the mountains. In her final moments, Milan’s mother entrusts her with a key. She reveals it will unlock the evidence that so many people have already died for—including Milan’s father. The only way Milan can survive, her mom tells her, is to let everyone believe she died with the other passengers.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Cancer
  • Blood & injury depiction
  • Death of a father in a car accident
  • Murder
  • Gun violence
  • Plane crash
  • Animal death

Silent Sister by Megan Davidhizar

Two sisters went missing on their class trip—Grace, the outgoing athlete who is friends with just about everyone, and Maddy, the wallflower wilting in her sister’s shadow who’d rather absorb herself in her journal than talk to her classmates. But when Grace is found—injured, with no memory of what happened—everybody thinks she’s lying. It’s hard not to look guilty with Maddy’s blood on her clothes Desperate to save her sister—and prove her own innocence—Grace must piece together what happened on that school trip with the help of her sister’s notebook and.,.. Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Teacher-student relationship
  • Amnesia
  • Bullying