The Shadow War by Lindsay Smith

The Shadow War by Lindsay Smith

World War II is raging, and five teens are looking to make a mark. Daniel and Rebeka seek revenge against the Nazis who slaughtered their family; Simone is determined to fight back against the oppressors who ruined her life and corrupted her girlfriend; Phillip aims to prove that he’s better than his worst mistakes; and Liam is searching for a way to control the portal to the shadow world he’s uncovered, and the monsters that live within it–before the Nazi regime can do the same. When the five meet, and begrudgingly team up, in the forests of Germany, none of them knows what their future might hold.

As they race against time, war, and enemies from both this world and another, Liam, Daniel, Rebeka, Phillip, and Simone know that all they can count on is their own determination and will to survive.

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Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Antisemitism
  • Torture
  • World War Two
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Our Year of Maybe by Rachel Lynn Solomon

Our Year of Maybe by Rachel Lynn Solomon

Aspiring choreographer Sophie Orenstein would do anything for Peter Rosenthal-Porter, who’s been on the kidney transplant list as long as she’s known him. Peter, a gifted pianist, is everything to Sophie: best friend, musical collaborator, secret crush. When she learns she’s a match, donating a kidney is an easy, obvious choice. She can’t help wondering if after the transplant, he’ll love her back the way she’s always wanted.

But Peter’s life post-transplant isn’t what either of them expected. Though he once had feelings for Sophie, too, he’s now drawn to Chase, the guitarist in a band that happens to be looking for a keyboardist… Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Ableism
  • Antisemitism
  • Pregnancy
  • Surgery (organ transplant)
  • Chronic pain
  • Death of a parent to cancer discussed
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Today Tonight Tomorrow by Rachel Lynn Solomon

Today Tonight Tomorrow by Rachel Lynn Solomon

It’s the last day of senior year. Rowan Roth and Neil McNair have been bitter rivals for all of high school, clashing on test scores, student council elections, and even gym class pull-up contests. While Rowan, who secretly wants to write romance novels, is anxious about the future, she’d love to beat her infuriating nemesis one last time.

When Neil is named valedictorian, Rowan has only one chance at victory: Howl, a senior class game that takes them all over Seattle, a farewell tour of the city she loves. But after learning a group of seniors is out to get them, she and Neil reluctantly decide to team up until they’re the last players left—and then they’ll destroy each other.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Antisemitism
  • Misogyny
  • Domestic abuse mentioned
  • Underage drug use
  • Car accident mentioned
  • Bullying
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Coming Out by Danielle Steel

Coming Out by Danielle Steel

All round high-flier Olympia Crawford Rubinstein has it all, a busy legal career, a solid marriage and a perfect family. She manages her life with grace and energy and there seems to be no challenge to which she cannot rise. Until one day she opens an invitation for her twin daughters to attend an exclusive coming out ball and her good fortune is changed irrevocably.

Chaos ensues as conflicting feelings emerge about the ball and Olympia finds herself at the heart of a severe family feud. Devastated, and pulled in all directions, Olympia is more determined than ever to steer her family through the event.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Antisemitism
  • Racism & racial slurs
  • Misogyny
  • Domestic abuse
  • Stalking
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The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood

The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood

The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood book cover

Offred is a Handmaid in the Republic of Gilead. She may leave the home of the Commander and his wife once a day to walk to food markets whose signs are now pictures instead of words because women are no longer allowed to read. She must lie on her back once a month and pray that the Commander makes her pregnant, because in an age of declining births, Offred and the other Handmaids are valued only if their ovaries are viable. Offred can remember the years before, when she lived and made love with her husband, Luke; when she played with and protected her daughter; when she had a job, money of her own, and access to knowledge. But all of that is gone now . . .

Funny, unexpected, horrifying, and altogether convincing, The Handmaid’s Tale is at once scathing satire, dire warning, and tour de force.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Queermisia
  • Misogyny (central theme)
  • Slavery
  • Racism and anti-semitism
  • Rape, sexual assault and non-consensual polygamy
  • Domestic abuse
  • Depression and suicide
  • Forced pregnancy and miscarriage
  • Death of a child
  • Murder
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Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

Little Women by Louisa May Alcott book cover

Here are talented tomboy and author-to-be Jo, tragically frail Beth, beautiful Meg, and romantic, spoiled Amy, united in their devotion to each other and their struggles to survive in New England during the Civil War.

It is no secret that Alcott based Little Women on her own early life. While her father, the freethinking reformer and abolitionist Bronson Alcott, hobnobbed with such eminent male authors as Emerson, Thoreau, and Hawthorne, Louisa supported herself and her sisters with “woman’s work,” including sewing, doing laundry, and acting as a domestic servant. But she soon discovered she could make more money writing. Little Women brought her lasting fame and fortune, and far from being the “girl’s book” her publisher requested, it explores such timeless themes as love and death, war and peace, the conflict between personal ambition and family responsibilities, and the clash of cultures between Europe and America.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Racism, sexism and anti-semitism
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The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

It is 1939. Nazi Germany. The country is holding its breath. Death has never been busier, and will be busier still.

By her brother’s graveside, Liesel’s life is changed when she picks up a single object, partially hidden in the snow. It is The Gravedigger’s Handbook, left behind there by accident, and it is her first act of book thievery. So begins a love affair with books and words, as Liesel, with the help of her accordian-playing foster father, learns to read. Soon she is stealing books from Nazi book-burnings, the mayor’s wife’s library, wherever there are books to be found.

But these are dangerous times. When Liesel’s foster family hides a Jew in their basement, Liesel’s world is both opened up, and closed down.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Racism, including blackface, and antiziganism (g slur)
  • Anti-semitism and Nazism (theme)
  • Ableism & ableist language
  • Parental abandonment & verbal abuse
  • PTSD & nightmares
  • Recreational drug use (smoking)
  • Emesis
  • Starvation
  • Gore depiction (dead bodies)
  • Death of a brother
  • Death of a child
  • Death of a father & uncle mentioned
  • Murder
  • Explosions, including air raids, and fire
  • Death by exposure to the cold
  • War themes* and battle scenes
  • Poverty themes
  • Bullying

*Set during WWII and discussed the Holocaust.

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Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, Vol 1: The Crucible by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa & Robert Hack

Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, Vol 1: The Crucible by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa & Robert Hack

Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, Vol 1: The Crucible by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasca and Robert Hack book cover

On the eve of her sixteenth birthday, the young sorceress Sabrina Spellman finds herself at a crossroads, having to choose between an unearthly destiny and her mortal boyfriend, Harvey. But a foe from her family’s past has arrived in Greendale, Madame Satan, and she has her own deadly agenda. Archie Comics’ latest horror sensation starts here! For TEEN+ readers. Compiles the first five issues of the ongoing comic book series Chilling Adventures of Sabrina.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Racism
  • Antisemitism
  • Lesbomisia & lesbomisic slurs
  • Rape implied
  • Suicide, on-page
  • Forced hospitalisation
  • Cannibalism
  • Animal murder 
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Yes No Maybe So by Becky Albertalli & Aisha Saeed

Yes No Maybe So by Becky Albertalli & Aisha Saeed

Yes No Maybe So by Becky Albertalli and Aisha Saeed book cover

Jamie Goldberg is cool with volunteering for his local state senate candidate—as long as he’s behind the scenes. When it comes to speaking to strangers (or, let’s face it, speaking at all to almost anyone), Jamie’s a choke artist. There’s no way he’d ever knock on doors to ask people for their votes…until he meets Maya. Maya Rehman’s having the worst Ramadan ever. Her best friend is too busy to hang out, her summer trip is canceled, and now her parents are separating. Why her mother thinks the solution to her problems is political canvassing—with some awkward dude she… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Misogyny
  • Racism, islamophobia & antisemitism
  • Hate crimes (off-page)
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Emesis recounted
  • Death of a grandfather recounted
  • Cyberharassment

Context : A secondary character takes pictures of the protagonists almost kissing and posts them online without their consent. This is discussed in-depth.

All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr

All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr

Marie-Laure lives in Paris near the Museum of Natural History, where her father works. When she is twelve, the Nazis occupy Paris and father and daughter flee to the walled citadel of Saint-Malo, where Marie-Laure’s reclusive great uncle lives in a tall house by the sea. With them they carry what might be the museum’s most valuable and dangerous jewel.

In a mining town in Germany, Werner Pfennig, an orphan, grows up with his younger sister, enchanted by a crude radio they find that brings them news and stories from places they have never seen or imagined. Werner becomes an expert at building and fixing these crucial new instruments and is enlisted to use his talent to track down the resistance. Deftly interweaving the lives of Marie-Laure and Werner, Doerr illuminates the ways, against all odds, people try to be good to one another. 

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Antisemitism & Nazism
  • Rape
  • Murder
  • Torture
  • Bullying
  • War themes*

*The book is set in France during World War 2.

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