Tag Archives: Child Abuse & Neglect

This page lists books that contain trigger warnings for the depiction of child abuse and neglect, including emotional, verbal, psychological and physical abuse, and gaslighting.

For child sexual abuse, see Paedophilia & CSA.

A Narrow Door by Joanne Harris

A Narrow Door by Joanne Harris

Now I’m in charge, the gates are my gates. The rules are my rules. It’s an incendiary moment for St Oswald’s school. For the first time in its history, a headmistress is in power, the gates opening to girls. Rebecca Buckfast has spilled blood to reach this position. Barely forty, she is just starting to reap the harvest of her ambition. As the new regime takes on the old guard, the ground shifts. And with it, the remains of a body are discovered. But Rebecca is here to make her mark. She’ll bury the past so deep it will evade even her own memory, just like she has done before. After all. You can’t keep a good woman down.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Child abuse
  • Paedophilia mentioned

Destructive King by Rachel Van Dyken

Destructive King by Rachel Van Dyken

‘I’m sorry for your loss.’ I would rather be tortured for eternity than hear those damn words from one more person, as if Claire, my dead fiancé, was a cell phone or car keys. How about, I’m sorry your life is over. I’m sorry you want to die too. I’m sorry you see her in your dreams and wake up only to relive the nightmare. I’m supposed to be the strongest of them all. Ash Abandonato, ruler, assassin, made man, brother, friend—instead, I hurt everyone I touch in hopes that they’ll feel even a sliver of the pain that bears down on my shoulders. I didn’t lose. It was taken from me. And it’s all her fault, Annie Smith. I daydream about… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Child abuse recounted
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a fiancé in a car accident

The Paris Betrayal by James Hannibal

The Paris Betrayal by James R. Hannibal

After a rough mission in Rome involving the discovery of a devastating bioweapon, Company spy Ben Calix returns to Paris to find his perfectly ordered world has collapsed. A sniper attack. An ambush. A call for help that brings French SWAT forces down on his head. Ben is out. This is a severance–reserved for incompetents and traitors. Searching for answers and anticipating a coming attack, Ben and a woman swept up in his misfortunes must travel across Europe to find the sniper who tried to kill him, the medic who saved his life, the schoolmaster who trained him, and an upstart hacker from his former team. More than… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Child abuse recounted
  • Knife violence
  • Explosion
  • Animal death

Darling Girl by Liz Michalski

Darling Girl by Liz Michalski

Life is looking up for Holly Darling, granddaughter of Wendy–yes, that Wendy. That is, until she gets a call that her daughter, Eden, who has been in a coma for nearly a decade, has gone missing from the estate where she’s been long tucked away. And, worst of all, Holly knows who must be responsible: Peter Pan, who is not only very real but very dangerous. Holly is desperate to find Eden and protect her son, Jack, from a terrible web of family secrets before she loses both her children. And yet she has no one to turn to–her mother, Jane, is the only other person in… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Rape & sexual assault
  • Panic attacks
  • Drug abuse
  • Death of a child
  • Car accident

The Silent Companions by Laura Purcell

When Elsie married handsome young heir Rupert Bainbridge, she believed she was destined for a life of luxury. But with her husband dead just weeks after their marriage, her new servants resentful, and the local villagers actively hostile, Elsie has only her husband’s awkward cousin for company. Or so she thinks. Inside her new home lies a locked door, beyond which is a painted wooden figure —a silent companion —-that bears a striking resemblance to Elsie herself. The residents of The Bridge are terrified of the figure, but Elsie tries to shrug this off as simple superstition–that is, until she notices the figure’s eyes following her.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Misogyny
  • Sexual assault
  • Child abuse
  • Suicide
  • Miscarriage
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a child
  • Murder
  • Fire
  • Animal death

Just Like Mother by Anne Heltzel

Just Like Mother by Anne Heltzel

The last time Maeve saw her cousin was the night she escaped the cult they were raised in. For the past two decades, Maeve has worked hard to build a normal life in New York City, where she keeps everything—and everyone—at a safe distance. When Andrea suddenly reappears, Maeve regains the only true friend she’s ever had. Soon she’s spending more time at Andrea’s remote Catskills estate than in her own cramped apartment. Maeve doesn’t even mind that her cousin’s wealthy work friends clearly disapprove of her single lifestyle. After all, Andrea has made her fortune in the fertility industry—baby fever comes with the territory… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Rape, on-page
  • Child abuse
  • Claustrophobia
  • Anxiety attack, on-page
  • Attempted suicide, on-page
  • Drugging
  • Forced impregnation
  • Infertility mentioned
  • Death of an infant mentioned
  • Murder
  • Car accident
  • Fire

In the Quick by Kate Hope Day

In the Quick by Kate Hope Day

June is a brilliant but difficult girl with a gift for mechanical invention who leaves home to begin gruelling astronaut training at the National Space Program. Younger by two years than her classmates at Peter Reed, the school on campus named for her uncle, she flourishes in her classes but struggles to make friends and find true intellectual peers. Six years later, she has gained a coveted post as an engineer on a space station—and a hard-won sense of belonging—but is haunted by the mystery of Inquiry, a revolutionary spacecraft powered by her beloved late… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Child abuse & neglect
  • Amputation
  • Death of a parent, off-page
  • Arson
  • Near-drowning incident

Ruthless People by J.J. McAvoy

Ruthless People by J.J. McAvoy

To the outside world, they look like American royalty, giving to charities, feeding the homeless, and rebuilding the city. But behind closed doors is a constant battle for dominance between two bosses, cultures, and hearts. Ruthless People is a romantic crime fiction set in modern day Chicago and follows the life and marriage of Melody Giovanni and Liam Callahan – rivals by blood and leaders through fear. Theirs is an arranged marriage with the goal of ending years of bloodshed between the Irish and the Italians. Liam assumes he’s getting a simple-minded wife, one he can… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Arranged marriage
  • Child abuse mentioned
  • Neglect & abandonment
  • Nyctophobia
  • Substance addiction
  • Drugging
  • Miscarriage
  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Hospitalisation
  • Needles mentioned
  • Death of a parent
  • Murder & attempted murder
  • Torture
  • Gun violence
  • Knife violence
  • Kidnapping
  • Plane crash

The Watchers by A.M. Shine

The Watchers by A.M. Shine

This forest isn’t charted on any map. Every car breaks down at its treeline. Mina’s is no different. Left stranded, she is forced into the dark woodland only to find a woman shouting, urging Mina to run to a concrete bunker. As the door slams behind her, the building is besieged by screams. Mina finds herself in a room with a wall of glass and an electric light that activates at nightfall when the Watchers come above ground. These creatures emerge to observe their captive humans—and terrible things happen to anyone who doesn’t reach the bunker in time… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Child abuse recounted
  • Drug use (smoking)
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Death of a husband
  • Death of a friend
  • Confinement

Nine Lives by Peter Swanson

Nine Lives by Peter Swanson

Nine strangers receive a list with their names on it in the mail. Nothing else, just a list of names on a single sheet of paper. None of the nine people know or have ever met the others on the list. They dismiss it as junk mail, a fluke – until very, very bad things begin happening to people on the list. First, a well-liked old man is drowned on a beach in the small town of Kennewick, Maine. Then, a father is shot in the back while running through his quiet neighbourhood in suburban Massachusetts. A frightening pattern is emerging, but what do these nine people have in common? Their professions range from… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Misogyny
  • Racism mentioned
  • Ableism (r slur), on-page
  • Sexual assault mentioned (groping)
  • Child abuse and neglect recounted including a mention of child sexual assault
  • Spousal abandonment
  • Abusive relationship (scs)
  • Cheating
  • Sex work, on-page
  • Familial estrangement mentioned
  • Alcohol consumption, on-page
  • Alcohol abuse (implied)
  • Recreational drug use, on-page
  • Chronic leg injury
  • Grief and loss depiction
  • Death of a girlfriend from an oxycontin overdose mentioned
  • Death of a husband and a pet dog in a car accident recounted
  • Death of a sister from drowning recounted
  • Murder by drowning
  • Murder by gun violence
  • Murder by poisoning
  • Stalking
  • Animal dead body mentioned (seagull)