Tag Archives: Cancer

Master’s Schiavo by Laura Lascarso

Patience, humility, subservience, gratitude… these are the virtues of a schiavo.

For three years, Giovanni has followed his Master’s rules with love and devotion. But when Master, a New York City crime lord, must tie up loose ends with the family business, Giovanni is sent away to embark upon a life no one could have prepared him for.

Forced to stay with Signore, Master’s younger brother, Giovanni realizes Signore is everything his Master is not – brash, boisterous, impulsive… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Rape
  • Substance addiction
  • Drug use
  • Grandparent with terminal cancer
  • Murder
  • Kidnapping
  • Blackmail

The Beauty in Breaking by Michele Harper

Michele Harper is a female, African American emergency room physician in a profession that is overwhelmingly male and white. Brought up in Washington, DC, in an abusive family, she went to Harvard, where she met her husband. They stayed together through medical school until two months before she was scheduled to join the staff of a hospital in central Philadelphia, when he told her he couldn’t move with her. Her marriage at an end, Harper began her new life in a new city, in a new job, as a newly single woman… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Racism
  • Child Abuse
  • Domestic abuse
  • Alcoholism
  • Abortion
  • Cancer
  • Death of a child

Those Pink Mountain Nights by Jen Ferguson

On July 28 at 6:30 p.m., Kiri Dunsmore walks out of the desert wearing her boyfriend’s sweatshirt, covered in his blood. Dazed and on the verge of unconsciousness, she tells a cashier that he’s still out there and most likely dead. The disappearance of Callum Massey, a “survival guru” with hundreds of thousands of YouTube followers, rocks the nation. And Kiri is a prime suspect. Back in Kiri’s hometown, true-crime fanatic Sam   is completely hooked on the case—especially now that she recognizes the suspect as shy Katie from high school. Although they didn’t know each other well… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Child abuse recounted
  • Adult-minor relationship
  • Depression
  • Medical treatment for cancer recounted
  • Murder of a mother recounted
  • Animal death

Out on a Limb by Hannah Bonam-Young

Winnifred “Win” McNulty has always been wildly independent. Not one to be coddled for her limb difference, Win has spent most of her life trying to prove that she can do it all on her own. And, with some minor adjustments, she’s done just fine. That is until she has a one-night stand with the incredibly charming Bo, a perfect stranger. And that one night changes everything. While Bo is surprisingly elated to step up to the plate, Win finds herself unsure of whether she can handle this new challenge on her own or if she’ll need a helping hand… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Ableism
  • Depression
  • Suicidal ideation recounted
  • Unplanned pregnancy
  • Amputation & loss of limb (leg)
  • Cancer (remission)
  • Death of a parent from suicide recounted, off-page

The Love Match by Priyanka Taslim

Zahra Khan is basically Bangladeshi royalty, but being a princess doesn’t pay the bills in Paterson, New Jersey. While Zahra’s plans for financial security this summer involve working long hours at Chai Ho and saving up for college writing courses, Amma is convinced that all Zahra needs is a “good match,” Jane Austen-style.

Enter Harun Emon, who’s wealthy, devastatingly handsome, and . . . aloof. As soon as Zahra meets him, she knows it’s a bad match. It’s nothing like the connection she has with Nayim Aktar, the new dishwasher at the tea shop, who just gets Zahra in a way no one has before… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Classism
  • Sexism
  • Death of a parent from cancer recounted, off-page
  • Bullying

Blazewrath Games by Amparo Ortiz

Lana Torres has always preferred dragons to people. In a few weeks, sixteen countries will compete in the Blazewrath World Cup, a tournament where dragons and their riders fight for glory in a dangerous relay. Lana longs to represent her native Puerto Rico in their first ever World Cup appearance, and when Puerto Rico’s Runner—the only player without a dragon steed—is kicked off the team, she’s given the chance.

But when she discovers that a former Blazewrath superstar has teamed up with the Sire—a legendary dragon who’s cursed into human form—the safety of the Cup is jeopardized… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Domestic & child abuse recounted
  • Alcoholism mentioned
  • Blood & injury depiction
  • Fire
  • Death of a partner from cancer mentioned
  • Death of a child
  • Murder
  • Torture
  • Kidnapping
  • Bullying

Too Hot to Touch by Katy James

He’s spent a lifetime putting up walls to protect himself, but he never expected one woman to break them all down. Between working multiple jobs and tackling her dissertation, it’s hardly unexpected PhD student Murray Silva is a hot mess. What is unexpected? Tyler Valentine. When the hockey playboy and former—okay, current—crush shows up in her summer school class, he immediately becomes the kind of distraction she doesn’t need. Want, however? That’s a whole other story. Tyler Valentine understands… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Homomisia & internalised homomisia including parental estrangement
  • Forced outing recounted
  • Anxiety & panic attacks
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Sports injuries including dislocated shoulders and broken bones
  • Parent in remission for breast cancer

*Context : The protagonist was outed by his partner to their hockey team in the past, resulting in bullying and being traded to another team.

Silver Nitrate by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

Montserrat has always been overlooked. She’s a talented sound editor, but she’s left out of the boys’ club running the film industry in ’90s Mexico City. And she’s all but invisible to her best friend, Tristán, a charming if faded soap opera star, though she’s been in love with him since childhood.
Then Tristán discovers his new neighbor is the cult horror director Abel Urueta, and the legendary auteur claims he can change their lives—even if his tale of a Nazi occultist imbuing magic into highly volatile silver nitrate stock sounds like sheer fantasy. The magic film was never finished, which is why, Urueta swears, his career vanished overnight. He is cursed…. Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Misogyny
  • Poverty themes
  • Racism, specifically Nazis, mentioned
  • Prejudice against Indigenous peoples mentioned
  • Attempted suicide mentioned
  • Suicidal ideations
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Substance abuse
  • Blood depiction
  • Cancer discussed
  • Grief depiction
  • Fire
  • Murder

Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff

Every story has two sides. Every relationship has two perspectives. And sometimes, it turns out, the key to a great marriage is not its truths but its secrets. At the core of this rich, expansive, layered novel, Lauren Groff presents the story of one such marriage over the course of twenty-four years.
At age twenty-two, Lotto and Mathilde are tall, glamorous, madly in love, and destined for greatness. A decade later, their marriage is still the envy of their friends… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Sexual assault
  • Sex work
  • Family estrangement
  • Agoraphobia
  • Depression
  • Eating disorder
  • Suicide
  • Drug use & overdose
  • Cancer

Love in the Big City by Sang Young Park

Young is a cynical yet fun-loving Korean student who pinballs from home to class to the beds of recent Tinder matches. He and Jaehee, his female best friend and roommate, frequent nearby bars where they push away their anxieties about their love lives, families, and money with rounds of soju and ice-cold Marlboro Reds that they keep in their freezer. Yet over time, even Jaehee leaves Young to settle down, leaving him alone to care for his ailing mother and to find companionship in his relationships with a series of men, including one whose handsomeness is matched by his coldness, and another who might end up being the great love of his life… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Homomisia
  • Dubious consent scenario
  • Depression
  • Suicide
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Cancer
  • Sexually transmitted diseases, specifically HIV & AIDS