BIPOC Lit – Page 56 – Trigger Warning Database

Afterlove by Tanya Byrne

Afterlove by Tanya Byrne

Ash Persaud is about to become a reaper in the afterlife, but she is determined to see her first love Poppy Morgan again, the only thing that separates them is death. Car headlights. The last thing Ash hears is the snap of breaking glass as the windscreen hits her and breaks into a million pieces like stars. But she made it, she’s still here. Or is she?

This New Year’s Eve, Ash is gets an RSVP from the afterlife she can’t decline: to join a clan of fierce girl reapers who take the souls of the city’s dead to await… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Suicide mentioned
Overdose mentioned
Grief & loss depiction

Wild Seed by Octavia Butler

Wild Seed by Octavia E. Butler

Doro knows no higher authority than himself. An ancient spirit with boundless powers, he possesses humans, killing without remorse as he jumps from body to body to sustain his own life. With a lonely eternity ahead of him, Doro breeds supernaturally gifted humans into empires that obey his every desire. He fears no one — until he meets Anyanwu. Anyanwu is an entity like Doro and yet different. She can heal with a bite and transform her own body, mending injuries and reversing aging. She uses her powers to cure her neighbours and birth entire tribes, surrounding herself with kindred who both fear and respect her. No one poses a true threat to Anyanwu — until she meets Doro… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Slavery
Rape
Sexual assault of a minor
Forced breeding

Patternmaster by Octavia Butler

Patternmaster by Octavia E. Butler

IIn the far future, the human race is divided into two groups striving for power. The Patternmaster rules over all, the leader of the telepathic Patternist race whose thoughts can destroy or heal at his whim. The only threat to his power are the Clayarks, mutant humans created by an alien pandemic, who now live either enslaved by the Patternists or in the wild.

Coransee, son of the ruling Patternmaster, wants the throne and will stop at nothing to get it, even if it means venturing into the wild mutant-infested… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Slavery
Torture, off-page

Clay’s Ark by Octavia Butler

Clay’s Ark by Octavia E. Butler

In an alternate America marked by volatile class warfare, Blake Maslin is traveling with his teenage twin daughters when their car is ambushed. Their attackers appear sickly yet possess inhuman strength, and they transport Blake’s family to an isolated compound. There, the three captives discover that the compound’s residents have a highly contagious alien disease that has mutated their DNA to make them powerful, dangerous, and compelled to infect others. If Blake and his daughters do not escape, they will be infected with a virus that will either kill them outright or transform them into outcasts whose very existence is a threat to the world around them… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Pandemic
Torture
Kidnapping
Imprisonment

Dawn by Jim Butcher

Dawn by Jim Butcher

In a world devastated by nuclear war with humanity on the edge of extinction, aliens finally make contact. They rescue those humans they can, keeping most survivors in suspended animation and begin the slow process of rehabilitating the planet.

When Lilith Iyapo is “awakened,” she finds that she has been chosen to revive her fellow humans in small groups by first preparing them to meet the utterly terrifying Oankali, then training them to survive on the wilderness that the planet has become… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Misogyny
Slavery
Rape
Medical experimentation

The Blood Trials by N. E. Davenport

The Blood Trials by N. E. Davenport

The blood spilled between the Republic of Mareen and the armies of the Blood Emperor long ago. The blood gifts of Mareen’s deadliest enemies. The blood that runs through the elite War Houses of Mareen, the rulers of the Tribunal dedicated to keeping the republic alive.

For his granddaughter, Ikenna, the only thing steady in her life was the man who had saved Mareen. The man who had trained her in secret, not just in martial skills, but in harnessing the blood gift that coursed through her…. Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Misogyny
Racism
Alcohol consumption
Blood depiction
Emesis

Fevered Star by Rebecca Roanhorse

Fevered Star by Rebecca Roanhorse

The great city of Tova is shattered. The sun is held within the smothering grip of the Crow God’s eclipse, but a comet that marks the death of a ruler and heralds the rise of a new order is imminent. The Meridian: a land where magic has been codified and the worship of gods suppressed. How do you live when legends come to life, and the faith you had is rewarded?

As sea captain Xiala is swept up in the chaos and currents… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Misgendering
Suicide
Self-harm for blood magic
Alcohol consumption
Blood & gore depiction
Body horror
Death of a parent recounted
Murder
Torture
War themes

Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse

Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse

In the holy city of Tova, the winter solstice is usually a time for celebration and renewal, but this year it coincides with a solar eclipse, a rare celestial event proscribed by the Sun Priest as an unbalancing of the world. Meanwhile, a ship launches from a distant city bound for Tova and set to arrive on the solstice. The captain of the ship, Xiala, is a disgraced Teek whose song can calm the waters around her as easily as it can warp a man’s mind.

Her ship carries one passenger. Described as harmless, the passenger… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Slavery mentioned
Homomisia mentioned
Abandonment
Child abuse & neglect
Emotional & physical abuse
Suicide
Alcoholism
Alcohol consumption & abuse
Drug use
Blood depiction
Physical injury
Beheading
Forced blinding
Scarring
Grief & loss depiction
Death of a parent
Death of a child
Mass murder
Poisoning
Kidnapping
Physical assault
Imprisonment
Cult
Animal death

Burn Down, Rise Up by Tirado Vincent

Burn Down, Rise Up by Tirado Vincent

For over a year, the Bronx has been plagued by sudden disappearances that no one can explain. Sixteen-year-old Raquel does her best to ignore it. After all, the police only look for the white kids. But when her crush Charlize’s cousin goes missing, Raquel starts to pay attention—especially when her own mom comes down with a mysterious illness that seems linked to the disappearances.

Raquel and Charlize team up to investigate, but they soon discover that everything…. Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Racism
Misogyny
Blood & gore depiction
Hospitalisation
Burns & scarring
Gun violence
Police brutality
Fire

Survive the Dome by Kosoko Jackson

Survive the Dome by Kosoko Jackson

Jamal Lawson just wanted to be a part of something. As an aspiring journalist, he packs up his camera and heads to Baltimore to document a rally protesting police brutality after another Black man is murdered.

But before it even really begins, the city implements a new safety protocol…the Dome. The Dome surrounds the city, forcing those within to subscribe to a total militarized shutdown. No one can get in, and no one can get out…. Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Racism & racial slurs
Gun violence
Police brutality
Strangulation