The Child Finder by Rene Denfeld

The Child Finder by Rene Denfeld

Three years ago, Madison Culver disappeared when her family was choosing a Christmas tree in Oregon’s Skookum National Forest. She would be eight years old now—if she has survived. Desperate to find their beloved daughter, certain someone took her, the Culvers turn to Naomi, a private investigator with an uncanny talent for locating the lost and missing. Known to the police and a select group of parents as “the Child Finder,” Naomi is their last hope. Naomi’s methodical search takes her deep into the icy, mysterious forest in the Pacific Northwest, and into her own fragmented past. She understands children like… Read more.

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Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Antiziganism (g slur)
  • Incest (foster siblings)
  • Paedophilia, child sexual assault and rape (theme)
  • Child abuse and neglect
  • Foster care system experiences recounted
  • Amnesia and memory loss
  • Dissociation
  • Blood and gore depiction
  • Physical injuries mentioned, including the loss of an arm in an explosion while deployed
  • Death of a foster mother, off-page and discussed
  • Death of a wife from cancer mentioned
  • Death of a wife from suicide mentioned
  • Accidental infanticide
  • Murder by stabbing, on-page
  • Physical assault
  • Kidnapping and captivity of a child
  • Incarceration
  • Graphic animal death and hunting
  • Animal dead bodies and butchery, on-page

Context : The story follows a private investigator trying to find a missing child. The book is told from her POV, the missing child, and the predator who kidnapped and held the child captive. While there are no on-page scenes of sexual violence, it is clear that the captor sexually abuses and rapes the child. It is vaguely mentioned through metaphors and lyrical writing from the child’s perspective; as well as mentions of pain and blood on her legs. The predator was also raped by his captor as a child. Again, there are no on-page scenes of this.

A secondary character leaves her baby in their stroller on a bus that is parked in storage. It is unclear how the baby dies but the protagonist finds his body (off-page, no descriptions).

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Fractured Tide by Leslie Lutz

Fractured Tide by Leslie Lutz

Sia practically grew up in the water scuba diving, and wreck dives are run of the mill. Take the tourists out. Explore the reef. Uncover the secrets locked in the sunken craft. But this time … the dive goes terribly wrong. Attacked by a mysterious creature, Sia’s boat is sunk, her customers are killed, and she washes up on a deserted island with no sign of rescue in sight. Waiting in the water is a seemingly unstoppable monster that is still hungry. In the jungle just off the beach are dangers best left untested. When Sia reunites with a handful of survivors, she sees it as the first sign of … Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Physical injuries
  • Dead bodies
  • Incarceration of a parent
  • Boating accident
  • Animal death
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Ace of Shades by Amanda Foody

Ace of Shades by Amanda Foody

Enne Salta was raised as a proper young lady, and no lady would willingly visit New Reynes, the so-called City of Sin. But when her mother goes missing, Enne must leave her finishing school—and her reputation—behind to follow her mother’s trail to the city where no one survives uncorrupted. Frightened and alone, Enne has only one lead: the name Levi Glaisyer. Unfortunately, Levi is not the gentleman she expected—he’s a street lord and a con man. Levi is also only one payment away from cleaning up a rapidly unravelling investment scam, so he doesn’t have time to investigate… Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Paedophilia
  • Gambling & mentions of past substance addiction
  • Blood & injury depiction including burns
  • Death of a mother
  • Death of a friend in a fire
  • Murder & regicide (on-page)
  • Torture
  • Physical assault
  • Poisoning
  • Bullying

Across a Field of Starlight by Blue Delliquanti

Across a Field of Starlight by Blue Delliquanti

When they were kids, Fassen’s fighter spaceship crash-landed on a planet that Lu’s survey force was exploring. It was a forbidden meeting between a kid from a war-focused resistance movement and a kid whose community and planet are dedicated to peace and secrecy. Lu and Fassen are from different worlds and separate solar systems. But their friendship keeps them in each other’s orbit as they grow up. They stay in contact in secret as their communities are increasingly threatened by the omnipresent, ever-expanding empire. As the empire begins a new attack against… Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Blood depiction
  • Emesis
  • Death of a parent, off-page
  • Gun violence
  • Car accident
  • War themes & colonialization
  • Animal death
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The Butchers by Ruth Gilligan

The Butchers by Ruth Gilligan

A photograph is hung on a gallery wall for the very first time since it was taken two decades before. It shows a slaughterhouse in rural Ireland, a painting of the Virgin Mary on the wall, a meat hook suspended from the ceiling – and, from its sharp point, the lifeless body of a man hanging by his feet. The story of who he is and how he got there casts back into Irish folklore, of widows cursing the land and of the men who slaughter its cattle by hand. But modern Ireland is distrustful of ancient traditions, and as the BSE crisis in England presents get-rich opportunities in Ireland, few care… Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Knife violence
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Harrow Lake by Kat Ellis

Harrow Lake by Kat Ellis

Lola Nox is the daughter of a celebrated horror filmmaker–she thinks nothing can scare her. But when her father is brutally attacked in their New York apartment, she’s quickly packed off to live with a grandmother she’s never met in Harrow Lake, the eerie town where her father’s most iconic horror movie was shot. The locals are weirdly obsessed with the film that put their town on the map–and there are strange disappearances, which the police seem determined to explain away. And there’s someone… Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Child abuse
  • Domestic abuse
  • Suicide discussed
  • Cannibalism mentioned
  • Hospitalisation of a parent
  • Blood depiction
  • Knife violence & stabbing
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My Soul to Take by Yrsa Sigurðardóttir

My Soul to Take by Yrsa Sigurðardóttir

If I die before I wake … A grisly murder is committed at a health resort situated in a recently renovated farmhouse, which turns out to be notorious for being haunted. Attorney Thora Gudmundsdottir is called upon by the owner of the resort — the prime suspect in the case — to represent him. Her investigations uncover some very disturbing occurrences at the farm decades earlier. Things that have never before seen the light of day..

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Nazisim mentioned
  • Incest mentioned
  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Death of a child recounted
  • Murder
  • Animal death
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Hold Back the Tide by Melinda Salisbury

Hold Back the Tide by Melinda Salisbury

Everyone knows what happened to Alva’s mother, all those years ago. But when dark forces begin to stir in Ormscaula, Alva has to face a very different future – and question everything she thought she knew about her past…

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Death of a mother
  • Death of a friend
  • Gun violence
  • Animal death
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Thirsty by Mia Hopkins

Thirsty by Mia Hopkins

My name is Salvador Rosas. Back in the barrio, my past is written on the walls: ESHB. Short for East Side Hollenbeck, my father’s gang—my gang. Hell, it’s a family tradition, one that sent both my brothers away. They used to call me “Ghost” because I haunted people’s dreams. Now I’ve got nothing going for me except a hipster gringo mentoring me in a new career. An ex-con making craft beer? No names. Still, people in this neighbourhood look out for one another. That’s how I became Vanessa Velasco’s unwelcome tenant. Chiquita pero picosa. She’s little, but with curves so sweet they’re dangerous. I remember… Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Racism
  • Recreational drug use
  • Blood & injury depiction
  • Hospital
  • Death of a mother in a car accident recounted
  • Death of a sister
  • Gang violence
  • Bombing
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Rise of the Fallen by Teagan Chilcott

Rise of the Fallen by Teagan Chilcott

Appearing as students at a local Brisbane high school, Emilie and Cael are centuries-old elementals on the run. Their inseparable bond starts to fray when Soul, an irresistible demon, comes on the scene and Emilie follows him into the savage world where she and Cael were once kept captive. Emilie is enchanted by Soul and a new existence where nothing is sacred – where death comes in the alleyway and graveyard brawls are commonplace – and she has to find her way among the shapeshifters and vampyres in a demon hierarchy as complex as algebra. At first Soul’s…. Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Blood depiction
  • Fire
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