Tag Archives: Cheating

This page lists books that contain trigger warnings for the depiction of cheating. Also known as infidelity.

The Overstory by Richard Powers

The Overstory by Richard Powers

An Air Force loadmaster in the Vietnam War is shot out of the sky, then saved by falling into a banyan. An artist inherits a hundred years of photographic portraits, all of the same doomed American chestnut. A hard-partying undergraduate in the late 1980s electrocutes herself, dies and is sent back into life by creatures of air and light. A hearing- and speech-impaired scientist discovers that trees are communicating with one another.

These four, and five other strangers – each summoned in different ways by trees – are brought together in a last and violent stand to save the continent’s few remaining acres of virgin forest.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Cheating
  • Suicide
  • Police brutality
  • Torture
  • Asphyxiation
  • Eco-terrorism

Eight Perfect Murders by Peter Swanson

Eight Perfect Murders by Peter Swanson

Years ago, bookseller and mystery aficionado Malcolm Kershaw compiled a list of the genre’s most unsolvable murders, those that are almost impossible to crack—which he titled “Eight Perfect Murders”—chosen from among the best of the best including Agatha Christie, Patricia Highsmith, and Donna Tartt. But no one is more surprised than Mal, now the owner of the Old Devils Bookstore in Boston, when an FBI agent comes knocking on his door one snowy day in February. She’s looking for information about a series of unsolved murders that look eerily similar to the killings on Mal’s old list. And the FBI agent isn’t the only… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Sexism
  • Homomisia
  • Rape
  • Cheating
  • Alcoholism
  • Substance addiction
  • Drug use & abuse
  • Alcohol consumption & abuse
  • Overdose
  • Death from a heart attack
  • Murder
  • Poisoning
  • Physical assault
  • Drowning
  • Gun violence
  • Car accident
  • Blackmail

The Kind Worth Killing by Peter Swanson

The Kind Worth Killing by Peter Swanson

Delayed in London, Ted Severson meets a woman at the airport bar. Over cocktails they tell each other rather more than they should, and a dark plan is hatched – but are either of them being serious, could they actually go through with it and, if they did, what would be their chances of getting away with it?

Back in Boston, Ted’s wife Miranda is busy site managing the construction of their dream home, a beautiful house out on the Maine coastline. But what secrets is she carrying and to what lengths might she go to protect the vision she has of her deserved future?

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Child abuse
  • Cheating
  • Murder
  • Stabbing
  • Car accident

Birthday Girl by Penelope Douglas

Birthday Girl by Penelope Douglas

He took me in when I had nowhere else to go. He doesn’t use me, hurt me, or forget about me. He listens to me, protects me, and sees me. I can feel his eyes on me over the breakfast table, and my heart pumps so hard when I hear him pull in the driveway after work. I have to stop this. It can’t happen. My sister once told me there are no good men, and if you find one, he’s probably unavailable. Only Pike Lawson isn’t the unavailable one. I am.

I took her in, because I thought I was helping. As the days go by, though, it’s becoming anything but easy. I have to stop my mind from drifting to her and stop holding my breath every time I bump into her in the house. I can’t touch her, and I shouldn’t want to. But we’re not free to give into this. She’s nineteen, and I’m thirty-eight. And her boyfriend’s father. Unfortunately, they both just moved into my house.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Cheating
  • Parental abandonment
  • Intimate partner abuse, off-page
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Death of a friend

Tender Is the Flesh by Agustina Bazterrica

Tender Is the Flesh by Agustina Bazterrica

His wife has left him, his father is sinking into dementia, and Marcos tries not to think too hard about how he makes a living. After all, it happened so quickly. First, it was reported that an infectious virus has made all animal meat poisonous to humans. Then governments initiated the “Transition.” Now, eating human meat—“special meat”—is legal. Marcos tries to stick to numbers, consignments, processing.

Then one day he’s given a gift: a live specimen of the finest quality. Though he’s aware that any form of personal contact is forbidden on pain of death, little by little he starts to treat her like a human being. And soon, he becomes tortured by what has been lost—and what might still be saved.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Sexual assault
  • Estrangement
  • Grey-area cheating
  • Childbirth
  • Dead bodies & body parts
  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Physical injuries & wounds
  • Body horror
  • Cannibalism (theme)
  • Dismemberment
  • Involuntary pregnancy
  • Infertility themes
  • Death of a child
  • Death of a parent
  • Imprisonment
  • Torture
  • Animal cruelty & abuse

Less by Andrew Sean Greer

Less by Andrew Sean Greer

Problem: You are a failed novelist about to turn fifty. A wedding invitation arrives in the mail: your boyfriend of the past nine years now engaged to someone else. You can’t say yes–it would all be too awkward–and you can’t say no–it would look like defeat. On your desk are a series of half-baked literary invitations you’ve received from around the world.

Question: How do you arrange to skip town? Answer: You accept them all. If you are Arthur Less.

Thus begins an around-the-world-in-eighty-days fantasia that will take Arthur Less to Mexico, Italy, Germany, Morocco, India and Japan and put thousands of miles between him… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Cheating
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Drug use
  • Terminal illness
  • Stroke

House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski

House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski

House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski

Years ago, when House of Leaves was first being passed around, it was nothing more than a badly bundled heap of paper, parts of which would occasionally surface on the Internet. No one could have anticipated the small but devoted following this terrifying story would soon command. Starting with an odd assortment of marginalized youth—musicians, tattoo artists, programmers, strippers, environmentalists, and adrenaline junkies—the book eventually made its way into the hands of older generations, who not only found themselves in those strangely arranged pages but also discovered a way back into the lives of their estranged children.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Rape
  • Incest
  • Sexual abuse
  • Child abuse & neglect
  • Adultery
  • Depersonalisation & derealisation
  • Alcoholism
  • Schizophrenia
  • Agoraphobia
  • Claustrophobia
  • Panic attacks
  • Hallucinations & delusions
  • Suicide
  • Drug use
  • Hospitalisation
  • Hypothermia
  • Loss of limb
  • Death of a sibling
  • Death of an uncle
  • Death of a child
  • Murder
  • Grief depiction
  • Gun violence
  • Stalking
  • Graphic death of a dog

RoomHate by Penelope Ward

RoomHate by Penelope Ward

When my grandmother died and left me half of the house on Aquidneck Island, there was a catch: the other half would go to the boy she helped raise. The same boy who turned into the teenager whose heart I broke years ago. The same teenager who’s now a man with a hard body and a hardass personality to match. I hadn’t seen him in years, and now we’re living together because neither one of us is willing to give up the house. The worst part? He didn’t come alone.

I’d soon realize there’s a thin line between love and hate. I could see through that smug smile. Beneath it all…the boy is still there. So is our connection. The problem is…now that I can’t have Justin, I’ve never wanted him more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Slut-shaming
  • Child neglect recounted
  • Cheating
  • Unplanned pregnancy

The Care and Feeding of Waspish Widows by Olivia Waite

The Care and Feeding of Waspish Widows by Olivia Waite

When Agatha Griffin finds a colony of bees in her warehouse, it’s the not-so-perfect ending to a not-so-perfect week. Busy trying to keep her printing business afloat amidst rising taxes and the suppression of radical printers like her son, the last thing the widow wants is to be the victim of a thousand bees. But when a beautiful beekeeper arrives to take care of the pests, Agatha may be in danger of being stung by something far more dangerous…

Penelope Flood exists between two worlds in her small seaside town, the society of rich landowners and the tradesfolk. Soon, tensions boil over when the formerly exiled Queen arrives on England’s shores—and when Penelope’s long-absent husband returns to Melliton, she once again finds herself torn… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Misogyny
  • Cheating mentioned
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Death of a sibling mentioned
  • Hanging mentioned
  • Whipping mentioned
  • Riot

The Layover by Lacie Waldon

The Layover by Lacie Waldon

After ten years as a flight attendant, Ava Greene is poised to hang up her wings and finally put down roots. She’s got one trip left before she bids her old life farewell, and she plans to enjoy every second of it. But then she discovers that former pilot Jack Stone — the absurdly gorgeous, ridiculously cocky man she’s held a secret grudge against for years — is on her flight. And he has the nerve to flirt with her, as if he doesn’t remember the role he played in the most humiliating night of her life. Good thing she never has to see him again after they land….

But when their plane encounters mechanical problems, what should have been a quick stop at the Belize airport suddenly becomes a weekend layover. Getting stuck on a three-hour flight with her nemesis was bad enough. Being stranded with him at a luxury resort in paradise? … Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Emotional cheating