BIPOC Lit – Page 32 – Trigger Warning Database

Rare Danger by Beverly Jenkins

Rare Danger by Beverly Jenkins

For Jasmine Ware, curating books for an exclusive clientele is her passion. Until an old friend, a dealer of rare books, goes missing and his partner is murdered. Linked to an artifact smuggled out of the ancient library at Timbuktu, the mystery draws Jasmine deeper into a plot that could cost her her life. Air force veteran and private security ace Torr Noble is accustomed to adrenaline-pumping stakes. He never expected a private librarian would be so intriguing, but Jasmine is full of surprises. As the connection between them burns hot, a powerful old enemy raises his head. Torr and Jasmine must work together to find the missing dealer.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Child sexual abuse recounted
Blood & gore depiction
Car accident
Gun violence
Kidnapping

Agnes at the End of the World by Kelly McWilliams

Agnes at the End of the World by Kelly McWilliams

Agnes loves her home of Red Creek–its quiet, sunny mornings, its dusty roads, and its God. There, she cares tirelessly for her younger siblings and follows the town’s strict laws. What she doesn’t know is that Red Creek is a cult, controlled by a madman who calls himself a prophet. Then Agnes meets Danny, an Outsider boy, and begins to question what is and isn’t a sin. Her younger brother, Ezekiel, will die without the insulin she barters for once a month, even though medicine is considered outlawed. Is she a sinner for saving him? Is her sister, Beth, a sinner for dreaming of the world beyond Red Creek? As the Prophet grows more… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Misogyny
Ableism
Statutory rape
Adult-minor relationship
Forced child marriage & polygyny
Paedophilia and child sexual abuse
Child abuse, on-page
Domestic violence mentioned
Depression
Pandemic
Serious physical injury
Diabetic shock & crisis
Hanging mentioned
Kidnapping recounted
Cults (theme)

Just Your Local Bisexual Disaster by Andrea Mosqueda

Just Your Local Bisexual Disaster by Andrea Mosqueda

Growing up in Texas’s Rio Grande Valley, Maggie Gonzalez has always been a little messy, but she’s okay with that. After all, she has a great family, a goofy group of friends, a rocky romantic history, and dreams of being a music photographer. Tasked with picking an escort for her little sister’s quinceañera, Maggie has to face the truth: that her feelings about her friends—and her future—aren’t as simple as she’d once believed. As Maggie’s search for the perfect escort continues, she’s forced to confront new (and old) feelings for three of her friends: Amanda, her best friend and first-ever crush; Matthew, her ex-boyfriend twice… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Misogyny
Bimisia & internalised bimisia
Alcohol consumption
Recreational drug use & smoking
Pregnancy (sc)
Death of a parent by police shooting, off-page

The Last Story of Mina Lee by Nancy Jooyoun Kim

The Last Story of Mina Lee by Nancy Jooyoun Kim

Margot Lee’s mother, Mina, isn’t returning her calls. It’s a mystery to twenty-six-year-old Margot, until she visits her childhood apartment in Koreatown, LA, and finds that her mother has suspiciously died. The discovery sends Margot digging through the past, unravelling the tenuous invisible strings that held together her single mother’s life as a Korean War orphan and an undocumented immigrant, only to realize how little she truly knew about her mother. Interwoven with Margot’s present-day search is Mina’s story of her first year in Los Angeles as she navigates the promises and perils of the American myth of reinvention. While… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Racism
Attempted rape & sexual assault
Sexual harassment
Domestic abuse mentioned
Suicidal ideation
Cancer
Death of a mother
Death of a daughter
Death of a husband
Gun violence
Stalking mentioned

All My Rage by Sabaa Tahir

All My Rage by Sabaa Tahir

Lahore, Pakistan. Then. Misbah is a dreamer and storyteller, newly married to Toufiq in an arranged match. After their young life is shaken by tragedy, they come to the United States and open the Cloud’s Rest Inn Motel, hoping for a new start. Juniper, California. Now. Salahudin and Noor are more than best friends; they are family. Growing up as outcasts in the small desert town of Juniper, California, they understand each other the way no one else does. Until The Fight, which destroys their bond with the swift fury of a star exploding. Now, Sal scrambles to run the family motel as his mother Misbah’s… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Racism & racial slurs
Islamomisia
Sexual assault of a child
Physical child abuse
Panic attacks
Alcohol consumption
Drug use & abuse, including a non-fatal overdose
Substance addiction
Alcoholism
Death of a parent
Police brutality
Bullying

When the Moon is Low by Nadia Hashimi

When the Moon is Low by Nadia Hashimi

Mahmoud’s passion for his wife Fereiba, a schoolteacher, is greater than any love she’s ever known. But their happy, middle-class world—a life of education, work, and comfort—implodes when their country is engulfed in war, and the Taliban rises to power. In Kabul, we meet Fereiba, a schoolteacher who puts her troubled childhood behind her when she finds love in an arranged marriage. But Fereiba’s comfortable life implodes when the Taliban rises to power and her family becomes a target of the new fundamentalist regime. Forced to flee with her three child… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Arranged marriage
Displacement & refugee experiences

Alliana, Girl of Dragons by Julie Abe

Alliana, Girl of Dragons by Julie Abe

Once upon a time, Alliana believed in dreams and fairy tales as sweet as spun-sugar clouds. Alliana wished on shooting stars, sure that someday she and her grandmother would be able to travel to the capital city to see the queen. Then her grandmother passed away—and those dreams disappeared in a disenchanted puff. Now Alliana’s forced to attend to the whims of her wicked stepmother—with long days of cleaning her stepfamily’s inn as her skin burns raw or staying up until the crack of dawn to embroider her stepsister’s ball gowns. Until she meets two beings who change her life forever—the first is a young nightdragon… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Child abuse
Grief & loss depiction
Death of parents
Animal injury? (dragon)

Waking Up Married by Reese Ryan

Waking Up Married by Reese Ryan

What’s wrong with a little fake marriage between friends? Their night on the town is a blank, but when Zora Abbott and Dallas Hamilton awaken in a Vegas hotel room, they’re man and wife. With news of the nuptials spreading virally, the high-profile best friends decide to stay married, temporarily. Maybe under the cover of marriage, Dallas can even make his best friend’s baby dream come true. But can their friendship survive their newly unleashed passions?

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Alcohol consumption
Recreational drug use, unintentional

Brown Girl in the Ring by Nalo Hopkinson

Brown Girl in the Ring by Nalo Hopkinson

The rich and privileged have fled the city, barricaded it behind roadblocks, and left it to crumble. The inner city has had to rediscover old ways-farming, barter, herb lore. But now the monied need a harvest of bodies, and so they prey upon the helpless of the streets. With nowhere to turn, a young woman must open herself to ancient truths, eternal powers, and the tragic mystery surrounding her mother and grandmother. She must bargain with gods, and give birth to new legends.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Domestic violence
Body horror
Medical procedures
Animal death

Song of Blood and Stone by L Penelope

Song of Blood & Stone by L. Penelope

The kingdoms of Elsira and Lagrimar have been separated for centuries by the Mantle, a magical veil that has enforced a tremulous peace between the two lands. But now, the Mantle is cracking and the True Father, ruler of Lagrimar and the most powerful Earthsinger in the world, finally sees a way into Elsira to seize power. All Jasminda ever wanted was to live quietly on her farm, away from the prying eyes of those in the nearby town. Branded an outcast by the colour of her skin and her gift of Earthsong, she’s been shunned all her life and has learned to steer clear from the townsfolk until a group of Lagrimari sold… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Racism
Attempted rape
Threats of rape
War themes