Tag Archives: Blood & Gore Depiction

If We Were Villains by ML Rio

Oliver Marks has just served ten years in jail – for a murder he may or may not have committed. On the day he’s released, he’s greeted by the man who put him in prison. Detective Colborne is retiring, but before he does, he wants to know what really happened a decade ago. As one of seven young actors studying Shakespeare at an elite arts college, Oliver and his friends play the same roles onstage and off: hero, villain, tyrant, temptress, ingenue, extra. But when the casting changes, and the secondary characters usurp the stars, the plays spill dangerously over… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Homomisia
  • Slut-shaming
  • Antiziganism (g slur)
  • Suicide
  • Drug use
  • Alcohol consumption & abuse
  • Overdose
  • Blood depiction
  • Murder

Redemptor by Jordan Ifueko

For the first time, an Empress Redemptor sits on Aritsar’s throne. To appease the sinister spirits of the dead, Tarisai must now anoint a council of her own, coming into her full power as a Raybearer. She must then descend into the Underworld, a sacrifice to end all future atrocities. Tarisai is determined to survive. Or at least, that’s what she tells her increasingly distant circle of friends. Months into her shaky reign as empress, child spirits haunt her, demanding that she pay for past sins of the empire. With the lives of her loved ones on the line assassination attempts from unknown… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Alcohol consumption
  • Drug use
  • Child abuse & neglect recounted
  • Blood depiction
  • Murder

Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt

Shots rang out in Savannah’s grandest mansion in the misty, early morning hours of May 2, 1981. Was it murder or self-defense? For nearly a decade, the shooting and its aftermath reverberated throughout this city of moss-hung oaks and shaded squares. John Berendt’s narrative reads like a thoroughly engrossing novel, and yet it is a work of nonfiction. Berendt interweaves a first-person account of life in this isolated remnant of the Old South with the unpredictable twists and turns of a landmark murder case. The story is peopled by a gallery of remarkable characters: the well… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Racism & racial slurs
  • Homomisia
  • Transmisia
  • Blood depiction
  • Murder
  • Gun violence

The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman

Lyra is rushing to the cold, far North, where witch clans and armored bears rule. North, where the Gobblers take the children they steal–including her friend Roger. North, where her fearsome uncle Asriel is trying to build a bridge to a parallel world. Can one small girl make a difference in such great and terrible endeavors? This is Lyra: a savage, a schemer, a liar, and as fierce and true a champion as Roger or Asriel could want–but what Lyra doesn’t know is that to help one of them will be to betray the other.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Alcohol consumption
  • Smoking mentioned
  • Blood & gore depiction including mentions of a decapitation
  • Involuntary medical experimentation on children
  • Emesis mentioned
  • Kidnapping & captivity of children
  • Gun violence
  • Plane crash (airship explosion)
  • Fire
  • Battle scenes

The Stonekeeper’s Curse by Kazu Kibuishi

Emily and Navin’s mother is still in a coma from the arachnopod’s poison, and there’s only one place to find help: Kanalis, the bustling, beautiful city of waterfalls. But when Em, her brother, and Miskit and the rest of the robotic crew aboard the walking house reach the city, they quickly realize that seeking help is looking for trouble…dangerous trouble.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Blood & physical injury depiction
  • Coma
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a father recounted
  • Attempted murder
  • Explosion
  • Physical assault
  • Fire

Bestiary by K-Ming Chang

Three generations of Taiwanese American women are haunted by the myths of their homeland in this spellbinding, visceral debut about one family’s queer desires, violent impulses, and buried secrets.

One evening, Mother tells Daughter a story about a tiger spirit who lived in a woman’s body. She was called Hu Gu Po, and she hungered to eat children, especially their toes. Soon afterwards, Daughter awakes with a tiger tail. And more mysterious events follow: Holes in the backyard spit up letters penned by her grandmother; a visiting aunt arrives with snakes in her belly… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Racism
  • Misogyny
  • Homomisia
  • Domestic violence
  • Child abuse
  • Dementia
  • Suicide & mass suicide mentioned
  • Miscarriage
  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Amputation
  • Animal abuse

Phaedra by Laura Shepperson

Phaedra has been cast to the side all her life: daughter of an adulteress, sister of a monster, and now unwilling bride to the much-older, power-hungry Theseus. Young, naïve, and idealistic, she has accepted her lot in life, resigned to existing under the sinister weight of Theseus’s control and the constant watchful eye of her handsome stepson Hippolytus.

When supposedly pious Hippolytus assaults her, Phaedra’s world is darkened in the face of untouchable, prideful power… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Rape
  • Suicide
  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Murder

Storms of Paine by Opal Reyne

After the storm that separates them, Captains Rosetta Silver and Alister Paine find themselves sailing side by side together once more. Their passion refuses to fizzle out and burns brighter, hotter, and, frighteningly, deeper every time. Rosetta manages to convince the land hating Alister to port. They need supplies and the Laughing Siren still needs repairs. But land may be dangerous for them and not just because of the bounty on his head. Emotions within Rosetta are stirring and she doesn’t have a compass to navigate these unfamiliar waters. Alister’s behaviour… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Domestic violence recounted
  • Miscarriage mentioned
  • Blood, gore & injury depiction

Sea of Roses by Opal Reyne

Captain Alister Paine has always had his good eye set on treasure, murder, and sinking ships. His fame as a ruthless, blood-thirsty pirate has spread across the Seven Seas. The Howling Death, his precious warship, is the deadliest ship on the ocean waters, striking fear into the hearts of all those who see it. So when a deceitful yet sensual woman steals his bloody ship from him, he wants nothing but revenge! His anger holds no bounds. He wants to punish her, but there is something about Rosetta Silver that has Alister drowning beneath the waves of his carnal desires. Despite her… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Sexism
  • Domestic violence recounted
  • Miscarriage recounted
  • Blood, gore and injury depiction

A Soul to Touch by Opal Reyne

All Mayumi ever wanted was to hunt Demons. After being discharged from the Demonslayer guild, Mayumi chose to isolate herself within the forest. The best place to hunt and kill Demons. But, one night, she’s surprised when a different monster is lured by her baits. Just before she unleashes an arrow that’s aimed to kill, Mayumi pauses. She realises she’s seen that skulled, feline face before and that it had once saved her life. All Faunus ever wanted was her. After the Demon King cracked his skull, Faunus returns to watch over the only human he has ever cared for. He knows what his future holds, she would never become his bride… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Pregnancy (epilogue)
  • Blood & injury depiction
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Animal death