Category Archives: Young Adult

The Grandest Game by Jennifer Lynn Barnes

Welcome to the Grandest Game, an annual competition run by billionaire Avery Grambs and the four infamous Hawthorne brothers, whose family fortune she inherited. Designed to give anyone a shot at fame and fortune, this year’s game requires one of seven golden tickets to enter. With millions on the line, those seven players will do whatever it takes to win. Some of the players are in it for the money. Some for power. Some for reasons all their own. Every single one of them has secrets. Amidst it all is Grayson Hawthorne, tasked with a vital role in this year’s game. But as… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Classism & misogyny
  • Terminal illness

Death at Morning House by Maureen Johnson

The fire wasn’t Marlowe Wexler’s fault. Dates should be hot, but not hot enough to warrant literal firefighters. Akilah, the girl Marlowe has been in love with for years, will never go out with her again. No one dates an accidental arsonist. With her house-sitting career up in flames, it seems the universe owes Marlowe a new summer job, and that’s how she ends up at Morning House, a mansion built on an island in the 1920s and abandoned shortly thereafter. It’s easy enough, giving tours. Low risk of fire. High chance of getting bored talking about stained glass and nut cutlets… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Forced pregnancy
  • Alcohol consumption & drugging
  • Pyschiatric hospitalisation mentioned
  • Death of a friend mentioned
  • Death of a sibling
  • Murder & attempted murder
  • Drowning
  • House fire & arson

The Whispering Dark by Kelly Andrew

Delaney Meyers-Petrov is tired of being seen as fragile just because she’s Deaf. So when she’s accepted into a prestigious program at Godbole University that trains students to slip between parallel worlds, she’s excited for the chance to prove herself. But her semester gets off to a rocky start as she faces professors who won’t accommodate her disability, and a pretentious upperclassman fascinated by Delaney’s unusual talents. Colton Price died when he was nine years old. Quite impossibly, he woke several weeks later at the feet of a green-eyed little girl. Now, twelve years later, Delaney Meyers-Petrov has stumbled back… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Ableism
  • Parental abandonment & child neglect
  • Alcohol consumption & drug use mentioned
  • Death of a child
  • Blood, gore & injury depiction
  • Murder
  • Kidnapping & stalking
  • Drowning
  • Fire
  • Car accident mentioned

Your Blood, My Bones by Kelly Andrew

Wyatt Westlock has one plan for the farmhouse she’s just inherited — to burn it to the ground. But during her final walkthrough of her childhood home, she makes a shocking discovery in the basement — Peter, the boy she once considered her best friend, strung up in chains and left for dead. Unbeknownst to Wyatt, Peter has suffered hundreds of ritualistic deaths on her family’s property. Semi-immortal, Peter never remains dead for long, but he can’t really live, either. Not while he’s bound to the farm, locked in a cycle of grisly deaths and painful rebirths. There’s only one way for him to break free. He needs to end the Westlock line… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Self-injury
  • Suicide by cutting throat
  • Alcohol consumption mentioned
  • Minor body horror
  • Torture recounted
  • Physical assault (fistfights) & stabbing
  • Drowning mentioned
  • Choking
  • Cult
  • Fire & arson
  • Animal death (chicken)

I Am Made of Death by Kelly Andrew

Following the death of his father, Thomas Walsh had to grow up quickly, taking on odd-jobs to keep food on the table and help pay his gravely ill mother’s medical bills. When he’s offered a highly paid position as an interpreter for an heiress who exclusively signs, Thomas — the hearing child of a Deaf adult — jumps at the opportunity. But the job is not without its challenges. Thomas is expected to accompany Vivienne wherever she goes, but from the start, she seems determined to shake him. To make matters worse, her parents keep her on an extremely short leash. She is not to go anywhere without express permission… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Alcohol consumption mentioned
  • Body horror
  • Nonconsensual surgery
  • Murder & ritual human sacrifice
  • Kidnapping
  • Gun violence
  • Choking
  • Fistfights resulting in hospitalisation

Growing Pangs by Kathryn Ormsbee and Molly Brooks

Katie knows there’s stuff that makes her different. She’s homeschooled, she has freckles, and her teeth are really crooked. But none of these things matter to Kacey. They’re best friends forever. But when they go to summer camp, Kacey starts acting weird. And when Katie gets home, she can’t stop worrying. About getting braces. About 6th grade. About friends. She knows tapping three times or opening and closing a drawer won’t make everything better . . . but sometimes it helps stop the worrying. Is something wrong with her? And will anyone want to be friends with her if they find out?

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)

Lucky Few by Kathryn Ormsbee

Stevie Hart is homeschooled, but don’t hold that against her. Sure, she and her best (okay, only) friend, Sanger, will never be prom queens, but that’s just because the Central Austin Homeschool Cooperative doesn’t believe in proms. Or dancing. Still, Stevie and Sanger know how to create their own brand of fun. Enter Max Garza, the new boy next door. After a near-fatal accident, Max is determined to defy mortality with a checklist: 23 Ways to Fake My Death Without Dying. Dead set on carrying out fabricated demises ranging from impalement to spontaneous… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Homophobia
  • Medical content including diabetic medical crisis & needles (protagonist)
  • Death of a parent in a car accident recounted

Turning Twelve by Kathryn Ormsbee and Molly Brooks

Katie can’t wait to turn twelve–pool parties! babysitting! friends! But sometimes it feels like there’s so much new stuff she can barely keep up. First Job? (Yes!) Unfair dress codes? (No way!) Make up (Okay?!) Shaving? (Uh…!) Maybe growing up isn’t as much fun as she had expected. But one thing does seem right–her new friend, Grace. Could Katie have a crush on another girl? Katie knows not everyone around her will approve…which is kind of scary. She might not be ready to tell anyone yet, and that’s fine…but can Katie stay true to herself and embrace the person she’s growing up to be?

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Homophobia
  • Anxiety & Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)

Missing Clarissa by Ripley Jones

In August of 1999, dazzlingly popular cheerleader Clarissa Campbell disappears from a party in the woods outside the rural town of Oreville, Washington and is never seen again. The police question her friends, teachers, and the adults who knew her—who all have something to hide. And thanks to Clarissa’s beauty, the mystery captures the attention of the nation. But with no leads and no body, the case soon grows cold. Despite the efforts of internet sleuths and true-crime aficionados, Clarissa is never found—dead or alive. Over twenty years later, Oreville high school… Read more,

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Ableism, racism & homophobia mentioned
  • Adult-minor teacher-student relationship & statutory rape
  • Blood & injury depiction
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Murder & attempted murder
  • Gun violence
  • Kidnapping

The Other Lola by Ripley Jones

In the months after Cam and Blair broke their small hometown’s legendary missing-girl story and catapulted to accidental fame, they vowed never to do it again. No more mysteries, no more podcasts, and no more sticking their heads where they don’t belong. Until Mattie Brosillard, a freshman at their high school, shows up on their doorstep, begging Cam and Blair for help. Mattie’s sister Lola disappeared mysteriously five years ago. No trace of her was ever found. Now, she’s back–but Mattie is convinced the girl who returned is an impostor. Nobody believes Mattie’s wild story–not Mattie’s brother, not Mattie’s mother, and… Read more,

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Homophobia
  • Adult-minor relationship mentioned
  • Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) & panic attack
  • Child abuse
  • Alcohol consumption & drug use
  • Catfishing
  • Bullying