Category Archives: Representation

Driven to Distraction by Olivia Dade

Constance Chen is not the demure kind of librarian. Sure, her high-horsepower ride is Big Bertha the Bookmobile, but Con swears a blue streak, does her own home improvement, and wears steel-toed boots. She has a tight circle of friends, a demanding, beloved sprawl of a Chinese-American family, and a strict hookups-only policy when it comes to men. Her life is just how she wants it. Except for one maddeningly sexy footnote. Sam Wolcott, her friend’s baby brother and the library’s IT star, has been throwing sparks with Con since he moved to town. To everybody… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Parental abandonment mentioned
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a parent

Desire and the Deep Blue Sea by Olivia Dade

Thomas McKinney has never wanted a woman the way he wants Callie Adesso. Since she started working alongside him at the Colonial Marysburg Research Library, he’s spent his desk shifts fumbling pencils, tripping over his own feet, and struggling to remember both the Dewey Decimal System and the existence of her inconvenient boyfriend. Now, however, Callie is suddenly single–and in need of a last-minute faux-boyfriend for an episode of HATV’s Island Match. Thomas is more than happy to play the part…and in the process, convince Callie that a week together isn’t nearly long enough. Callie has never… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Anxiety
  • Alcohol consumption

All the Feels by Olivia Dade

Alexander Woodroe has it all. Charm. Sex appeal. Wealth. Fame. A starring role as Cupid on TV’s biggest show, God of the Gates. But the showrunners have wrecked his character, he’s dogged by old demons, and his post-show future remains uncertain. When all that reckless emotion explodes into a bar fight, the tabloids and public agree: his star is falling. Enter Lauren Clegg, the former ER therapist hired to keep him in line. Compared to her previous work, watching over handsome but impulsive Alex shouldn’t be especially difficult. But the more time they spend together, the harder it gets to keep her professional… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Fatphobia
  • Domestic violence discussed (off-page, secondary character)

Shine On, Luz Véliz! by Rebecca Balcárcel

Luz Véliz is a soccer star―or rather, she was a soccer star. With her serious knee injury, it’s unlikely she’ll be back on the field anytime soon. But without soccer, who is she? Even her dad treats her differently now—like he doesn’t know her or, worse, like he doesn’t even like her. When Luz discovers she has a knack for coding, it feels like a lifeline to a better self. If she can just ace the May Showcase, she’ll not only skip a level in her coding courses and impress Ms. Freeman and intriguing, brilliant Trevor—she’ll have her parents cheering her on from the sidelines, just the way she likes it… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Disappearance of a child recounted
  • Gang violence in Guatemala mentioned

Deep Down by Mia Hopkins

Resilient and disciplined, tsunami survivor Eve Ono moves to California from Japan looking for a position as a sushi chef. When she’s suddenly fired from her restaurant job, desperation drives her to find work on a fishing boat despite her fears of the ocean. To make matters worse, she’s stuck in close quarters with her new captain—a man whose raw physicality drives her out of her mind with lust. Free-spirited and roguish, Sam Lamont is a commercial fisherman aboard his own dive boat, the Bravado. When he makes a bad deal with a deadly loan shark who threatens to… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Hospitalisation
  • Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) & trauma
  • Panic attacks (on-page)
  • Death of grandparents in a tsunami recounted
  • Shark attack (on-page)

In the Wreckage by Hailey Turner

Captain Jamie Callahan got a new lease on life when he survived a chemical attack that turned him into a metahuman. Now he leads Alpha Team, the Metahuman Defense Force’s top strike group, a position that puts him at odds with his elite political family. Determined to do his duty, Jamie’s commitment to his team creates a loneliness that is increasingly difficult to ignore. Staff Sergeant Kyle Brannigan is a sniper with secrets. Seconded to Alpha Team, he finds himself torn between his desire for Jamie and his desperate need to fly under the radar. But Jamie is everything Kyle… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Drugging
  • Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) & trauma
  • Vivisepulture (being buried alive)
  • Terrorism
  • Military warfare

In the Solace by Hailey Turner

Colonel Liam Wessex is happy to see Jamie Callahan and Kyle Brannigan finally married, but it leaves him wishing his own life wasn’t such a mess. With his classified identity revealed to the British public, Liam struggles with the transition into civilian life. When MI6 Agent Oliver Archer stumbles back into his world, Liam has a second chance to make things right between them, if only the prickly agent would let him close again. Oliver thought he’d done enough to cut Liam out of his life for good after a disastrous night together during their youth. But when terrorists… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Torture
  • Bombing
  • Electrocution
  • Kidnapping
  • Car accident
  • Terrorism
  • Bullying mentioned

In the Shadows by Hailey Turner

Staff Sergeant Alexei Dvorkin has a history with spies that typically ends with most of them dead. But Agent Sean Delaney is proving to be the frustrating exception to every one of Alexei’s rules of engagement. As part of Alpha Team’s long-running mission to stop an enemy metahuman, the two are constantly forced to work together, resulting in a simmering attraction neither can ignore. When the MDF tasks them with finding evidence of criminal wrongdoing against the owner of a private military company, Sean knows… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Terrorism
  • Kidnapping & hostage situation

In the Blood by Hailey Turner

Captain Jamie Callahan is running out of time in his efforts to outsmart an enemy metahuman. His father’s presidential campaign is ramping up, and Jamie’s top secret identity as a metahuman himself is at risk of being revealed by the enemy, to say nothing of his secret relationship with Staff Sergeant Kyle Brannigan. As Alpha Team’s long-running mission gets derailed in the worst way possible, Staff Sergeant Alexei Dvorkin discovers the enemy is playing for keeps, and neither he nor Agent Sean Delaney are in any… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Threats of rape
  • Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) & trauma
  • Graphic torture, including waterboarding, dental torture, skinning, and beating
  • Erotic asphyxia
  • Chemical bombing
  • Terrorism

Fire in the Heart by Hailey Turner

Alexei Dvorkin has come a long way since being turned into a metahuman, and all he wants to do is marry the man he loves. A wedding is easy, but it’s the honeymoon where his and Sean’s past unexpectedly catches up with them. All Sean Delaney wanted was a romantic honeymoon with his new husband. When he and Alexei stumble into a fellow operative’s mission on a luxury gambling resort island, they get more than they bargained for in their newly-minted civilian lives. Forced to choose between staying and joining the mission or leaving to stay safe and postpone their… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Torture
  • Fire
  • Electrocution
  • Hostage situation
  • Terrorism