Beauty in the Breakdown by Tegan Anderson

Beauty in the Breakdown by Tegan Anderson

Beauty in the Breakdown by Tegan Anderson book cover

Family. Money. Run. Three things that Josh Ray and Clara Roberts have their entire life based around. It’s an endless loop of get away from family, get money and get running. After a few months of what feels like stability, Josh and Clara have to start the cycle all over again until everything finally comes to an end. There was something beautiful in the way that things broke down. ‘Beauty in the Breakdown’ represents the importance of trust and self-discovery in an unstable lifestyle through the eyes of Josh Ray, someone who believes that there is always something beautiful in a breakdown.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Alcoholism, anxiety & depression
  • Suicide & self-harm discussed
  • Needles
  • Murder (on-page)

Herding Cats by Sarah Anderson

Herding Cats by Sarah Anderson

Herding Cats by Sarah Anderson book cover

Sixteen-year-old Alison has been sectioned in a mental institute for teens, having murdered the most perfect and popular girl at school. But the case is a mystery: no body has been found, and Alison’s condition is proving difficult to diagnose. Alison herself can’t explain what happened: one minute she was fighting with Tori — the next she disintegrated. Into nothing. But that’s impossible. Right?

When Alison meets Dr Faraday, a visiting psychologist, she feels an instant connection. More, he believes her story. But there’s more to Faraday than Alison can possibly imagine … and the answers he will give her are … extraordinary …

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Sexism and racism (mentioned)
  • Anxiety and panic attacks
  • Online harassment/cyberbullying
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The Weight of Our Sky by Hanna Alkaf

The Weight of Our Sky by Hanna Alkaf

Melati Ahmad looks like your typical moviegoing, Beatles-obsessed sixteen-year-old. Unlike most other sixteen-year-olds though, Mel also believes that she harbors a djinn inside her, one who threatens her with horrific images of her mother’s death unless she adheres to an elaborate ritual of counting and tapping to keep him satisfied.

But there are things that Melati can’t protect her mother from. On the evening of May 13th, 1969, racial tensions in her home city of Kuala Lumpur boil over. The Chinese and Malays are at war, and Mel and her mother become separated by a city in flames.

With a 24-hour curfew in place and all lines of communication down, it will take the help of a Chinese boy named Vincent and all of the courage and grit in Melati’s arsenal to overcome the violence on the streets, her own prejudices, and her djinn’s surging power to make it back to the one person she can’t risk losing.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Ableism, internalised ableism & ableist language
  • Racism & race riots (theme)
  • Anxiety & panic attacks
  • OCD & intrusive thoughts (protagonist)
  • Hospital
  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Emesis
  • Death of a mother discussed
  • Murder & attempted murder
  • Knife violence
  • Fire & being burned alive
  • Hostage situation
  • Displacement & homelessness
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What If It’s Us by Becky Albertalli & Adam Silvera

What If It’s Us by Becky Albertalli & Adam Silvera

Arthur is only in New York for the summer, but if Broadway has taught him anything, it’s that the universe can deliver a show stopping romance when you least expect it. Ben thinks the universe needs to mind its business. If the universe had his back, he wouldn’t be on his way to the post office carrying a box of his ex-boyfriend’s things. But when Arthur and Ben meet-cute at the post office, what exactly does the universe have in store for them? Maybe nothing. After all, they get separated. Maybe everything. After all, they get reunited… But what if it is?

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Homophobia & coming out themes
  • Racism
  • Cheating recounted
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Hospitalisation for a panic attack (secondary character)

The Upside of Unrequited by Becky Albertalli

The Upside of Unrequited by Becky Albertalli

Seventeen-year-old Molly Peskin-Suso knows all about unrequited love—she’s lived through it twenty-six times. She crushes hard and crushes often, but always in secret. Because no matter how many times her twin sister, Cassie, tells her to woman up, Molly can’t stomach the idea of rejection. So she’s careful. Fat girls always have to be careful. Then a cute new girl enters Cassie’s orbit, and for the first time ever, Molly’s cynical twin is a lovesick mess… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Racist microaggressions & antisemitism
  • Fatphobia and body-shaming (theme)
  • Anxiety & panic attacks
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Bullying

Lost in the Never Woods by Aiden Thomas

Lost in the Never Woods by Aiden Thomas book cover

When children go missing, people want answers. When children go missing in the small coastal town of Astoria, people look to Wendy for answers. It’s been five years since Wendy and her two brothers went missing in the woods, but when the town’s children start to disappear, the questions surrounding her brothers’ mysterious circumstances are brought back into light. Attempting to flee her past, Wendy almost runs over an unconscious boy lying in the middle of the road, and gets pulled into the mystery haunting the town. Peter, a boy she thought lived only in her stories, claims that if they don’t do something, the missing child… Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Anxiety, trauma & flashbacks
  • Blood depiction
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a children (on-page)
  • Murder
  • Gun violence
  • Kidnapping
  • Disappearance of a child & family members
  • Car accident

The Wicker King by K Ancrum

The Wicker King by K. Ancrum

When August learns that his best friend, Jack, shows signs of degenerative hallucinatory disorder, he is determined to help Jack cope. Jack’s vivid and long-term visions take the form of an elaborate fantasy world layered over our own—a world ruled by the Wicker King. As Jack leads them on a quest to fulfill a dark prophecy in this alternate world, even August begins to question what is real or not.

August and Jack struggle to keep afloat as they teeter between fantasy and their own emotions. In the end, each must choose his own truth.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Ableist language
  • Child abuse & neglect (theme)
  • Panic attacks & anxiety attacks
  • Depression & depressive episodes
  • Degenerative hallucinatory disorder, hallucinations & delusions
  • Trauma, codependency & separation anxiety
  • Suicidal ideation and self-harm
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Needles
  • Surgery
  • Forced psychiatric hospitalisation
  • Fire & pyromania
  • Drowning
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A Song Below Water by Bethany C. Morrow

A Song Below Water by Bethany C. Morrow

A Song Below Water by Bethany C. Morrow book cover

Tavia is already at odds with the world, forced to keep her siren identity under wraps in a society that wants to keep her kind under lock and key. Never mind she’s also stuck in Portland, Oregon, a city with only a handful of black folk and even fewer of those with magical powers. At least she has her bestie Effie by her side as they tackle high school drama, family secrets, and unrequited crushes.

But everything changes in the aftermath of a siren murder trial that rocks the nation; the girls’ favorite Internet fashion icon reveals she’s also a siren, and the news rips through their community. Tensions escalate when Effie starts being haunted by demons from her past, and Tavia accidentally lets out her magical voice during a police stop. No secret seems safe anymore—soon Portland won’t be either.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Racism & racist microaggressions
  • Racial profiling
  • Misogyny & misogynoir
  • Parental abandonment
  • Child abuse
  • Anxiety & anxiety attacks
  • Self-harm
  • Suicide attempt recounted, on-page
  • Scars
  • Death of a mother by cancer recounted
  • Death of a child implied
  • Disappearance of a friend
  • Murde, off-page
  • Kidnapping & confinement
  • Police brutality & violence
  • Bullying
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You Should See Me in a Crown by Leah Johnson

You Should See Me in a Crown by Leah Johnson

Liz Lighty has always believed she’s too black, too poor, too awkward to shine in her small, rich, prom-obsessed midwestern town. But it’s okay — Liz has a plan that will get her out of Campbell, Indiana, forever: attend the uber-elite Pennington College, play in their world-famous orchestra, and become a doctor.

But when the financial aid she was counting on unexpectedly falls through, Liz’s plans come crashing down . . . until she’s reminded of her school’s scholarship for prom king and queen. There’s nothing Liz wants to do less than endure a gauntlet of social media trolls, catty competitors, and humiliating public events,.. Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Classism
  • Racism
  • Queermisia, specifically lesbomisia & transmisia
  • Public outing
  • Anxiety & panic attacks
  • Emesis
  • Hospital visits due to medical emergency
  • Chronic illness (sickle cell anemia)
  • Death of a mother recounted
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A Song of Wraiths and Ruin by Roseanne A Brown

A Song of Wraiths & Ruin by Roseanne A. Brown

For Malik, the Solstasia festival is a chance to escape his war-stricken home and start a new life with his sisters in the prosperous desert city of Ziran. But when a vengeful spirit abducts Malik’s younger sister, Nadia, as payment into the city, Malik strikes a fatal deal—kill Karina, Crown Princess of Ziran, for Nadia’s freedom.

But Karina has deadly aspirations of her own. Her mother, the Sultana, has been assassinated; her court threatens mutiny; and Solstasia looms like a knife over her neck. Grief-stricken, Karina decides to resurrect her mother through ancient magic . . . requiring the beating heart of a king. And she knows just how to obtain one: by offering her hand in marriage to the victor of the Solstasia competition.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Ableism & ableist language
  • Racism and racial slurs
  • Colonialism themes
  • Refugee experiences
  • Riots and stampede
  • Police brutality
  • Emotional & physical child abuse
  • Cheating mentioned
  • Anxiety
  • Panic attack, described in detail on-page
  • Hallucinations
  • Depersonalisation & derealization
  • Self-harm & self-harm ideation
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Emesis
  • Blood depiction
  • Grief & loss depiction (theme)
  • Death of a father recounted
  • Death of a mother, on-page
  • Death of a sister recounted
  • Death in a fire recounted
  • Hostage situation
  • Kidnapping & attempted kidnapping
  • Knife violence & stabbing
  • Murder & attempted murder
  • Regicide
  • Whipping of feet mentioned
  • Animal cruelty
  • Animal death, including animal sacrifice
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