The Ogress and the Orphans by Kelly Barnhill 

The Ogress and the Orphans by Kelly Barnhill

Stone-in-the-Glen, once a lovely town, has fallen on hard times. Fires, floods, and other calamities have caused the people to lose their library, their school, their park, and even their neighbourliness. The people put their faith in the Mayor, a dazzling fellow who promises he alone can help. After all, he is a famous dragon slayer. (At least, no one has seen a dragon in his presence.) Only the clever children of the Orphan House and the kindly Ogress at the edge of town can see how dire the town’s problems are… Read more.

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Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Alcohol consumption mentioned
  • Disappearance of a child
  • Fire
  • Animal attack (birds)
  • Animal abuse & injury*

*Explanation : A dog is blinded by his previous abusive owner.

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The Girl Who Drank the Moon by Kelly Barnhill 

The Girl Who Drank the Moon by Kelly Barnhill

Every year, the people of the Protectorate leave a baby as an offering to the witch who lives in the forest. They hope this sacrifice will keep her from terrorizing their town. But the witch in the forest, Xan, is kind and gentle. She shares her home with a wise Swamp Monster named Glerk and a Perfectly Tiny Dragon, Fyrian. Xan rescues the abandoned children and deliver them to welcoming families on the other side of the forest, nourishing the babies with starlight on the journey. 

One year, Xan accidentally feeds a baby moonlight instead of starlight, filling the ordinary… Read more.

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Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Ableism & ableist language
  • Abandonment
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a grandmother
  • Infanticide
  • Kidnapping & captivity
  • Animal injury
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Obie Is Man Enough by Schuyler Bailar

Obie Is Man Enough by Schuyler Bailar

Obie knew his transition would have ripple effects. He has to leave his swim coach, his pool, and his best friends. But it’s time for Obie to find where he truly belongs. As Obie dives into a new team, though, things are strange. Obie always felt at home in the water, but now he can’t get his old coach out of his head. Even worse are the bullies that wait in the locker room and on the pool deck. Luckily, Obie has family behind him. And maybe some new friends too, including Charlie, his first crush. Obie is ready to prove he can be one of the fastest boys in the water–to his coach, his critics, and his biggest competition: himself.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Slut-shaming
  • Homomisia
  • Transmisia & transmisic slurs
  • Deadnaming
  • Misgendering
  • Outing
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a grandparent
  • Physical assault
  • Bullying
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Lifelike by Jay Kristoff

LIFEL1K3 by Jay Kristoff

It’s just another day on the Scrap: lose the last of your credits at the WarDome, dodge the gangs and religious fanatics, discover you can destroy electronics with your mind, stumble upon the deadliest robot ever built When Eve finds the ruins of an android boy named Ezekiel in the scrap pile she calls home, her entire world comes crashing down. With her best friend and her robotic sidekick in tow, she and Ezekiel will trek across deserts of irradiated glass, battle cyborg assassins, and scour abandoned megacities to save the ones she loves and learn the dark secrets of her past.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Ableism
  • Suicide
  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Amputation
  • Death of a grandfather from cancer
  • Murder
  • Gun violence
  • Explosions
  • Comas
  • Physical assault
  • Kidnapping
  • Animal death
  • Animal injury
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Everybody Sees the Ants by AS King

Everybody Sees the Ants by A.S. King

Lucky Linderman didn’t ask for his life. He didn’t ask his grandfather not to come home from the Vietnam War. He didn’t ask for a father who never got over it. He didn’t ask for a mother who keeps pretending their dysfunctional family is fine. And he didn’t ask to be the target of Nader McMillan’s relentless bullying, which has finally gone too far. But Lucky has a secret–one that helps him wade through the daily mundane torture of his life. In his dreams, Lucky escape to the war-ridden jungles of Laos, the prison his grandfather… Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Cheating
  • Prescription drug abuse
  • Suicide discussed
  • Death of a grandfather in the Vietnam War recounted
  • Physical assault
  • Graphic bullying (theme)
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From Twinkle, with Love by Sandhya Menon

From Twinkle, with Love by Sandhya Menon

Aspiring filmmaker and wallflower Twinkle Mehra has stories she wants to tell and universes she wants to explore, if only the world would listen. So when fellow film geek Sahil Roy approaches her to direct a movie for the upcoming Summer Festival, Twinkle is all over it. The chance to publicly showcase her voice as a director? Dream come true. The fact that it gets her closer to her longtime crush, Neil Roy-a.k.a. Sahil’s twin brother? Dream come true x 2.

When mystery man N begins emailing her, Twinkle is sure it’s Neil, finally ready to begin their happily-ever-after. The only slightly inconvenient problem is that, in the course of movie-making, she’s fallen madly in love with the irresistibly adorkable Sahil. Twinkle soon realizes that resistance is futile: The romance she’s got is not the one she’s scripted. But will it be enough?

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Racism
  • Parental neglect
  • Death of a grandmother recounted
  • Bullying
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The Cousins by Karen McManus

The Cousins by Karen M. McManus

Echo Ridge is small-town America. Ellery’s never been there, but she’s heard all about it. Her aunt went missing there at age seventeen. And only five years ago, a homecoming queen put the town on the map when she was killed. Now Ellery has to move there to live with a grandmother she barely knows.

The town is picture-perfect, but it’s hiding secrets. And before school even begins for Ellery, someone’s declared open season on homecoming, promising to make it as dangerous as it was five years ago. Then, almost as if to prove it, another girl goes missing.

Ellery knows all about secrets. Her mother has them; her grandmother does too. … Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Racist microaggressions
  • Sexism
  • Sexual harassment
  • Cheating
  • Parental abuse & neglect
  • Parental abandonment
  • Familial disownment & estrangement (central theme)
  • Pregnancy discussed
  • Miscarriage recounted
  • Alcohol consumption & abuse
  • Alcoholism
  • Death of a father & grandfather mentioned
  • Death of a mother & grandmother mentioned
  • Death of a son mentioned
  • Drowning mentioned
  • Death in a car accident mentioned
  • Murder recounted
  • Gun violence
  • Hostage situation
  • Housefire & death from smoke inhalation mentioned
  • Financial struggles & bankruptcy discussed

The Pearl Thief by Elizabeth Wein

The Pearl Thief by Elizabeth Wein

When fifteen-year-old Julia Beaufort-Stuart wakes up in the hospital, she knows the lazy summer break she’d imagined won’t be exactly like she anticipated. And once she returns to her grandfather’s estate, a bit banged up but alive, she begins to realize that her injury might not have been an accident. One of her family’s employees is missing, and he disappeared on the very same day she landed in the hospital. Desperate to figure out what happened, she befriends Euan McEwen, the Scottish Traveller boy who found her when she was injured, and his standoffish sister, Ellen. As Julie grows closer to this family, sh… Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Attempted sexual assault
  • Death of a grandfather recounted

The Paper Girl of Paris by Jordyn Taylor

The Paper Girl of Paris by Jordyn Taylor

Sixteen-year-old Alice is spending the summer in Paris, but she isn’t there for pastries and walks along the Seine. When her grandmother passed away two months ago, she left Alice an apartment in France that no one knew existed. An apartment that has been locked for more than seventy years.

Alice is determined to find out why the apartment was abandoned and why her grandmother never once mentioned the family she left behind when she moved to America after World War II. With the help of Paul, a charming Parisian student, she sets out to uncover the truth. However, the more time she spends digging through the mysteries of the past, the more she realizes there are secrets in the present that her family is still refusing to talk about… Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Parent with depression
  • Attempted suicide of a parent recounted
  • Death of a grandmother, off-page
  • World War Two

Twice in a Blue Moon by Christina Lauren

Twice in a Blue Moon by Christina Lauren

During a whirlwind two-week vacation abroad, Sam and Tate fell for each other in only the way that first loves do: sharing all of their hopes, dreams, and deepest secrets along the way. Sam was the first, and only, person that Tate—the long-lost daughter of one of the world’s biggest film stars—ever revealed her identity to. So when it became clear her trust was misplaced, her world shattered for good.

Fourteen years later, Tate, now an up-and-coming actress, only thinks about her first love every once in a blue moon. When she steps onto the set of her first big break, he’s the last person she expects to see. Yet here Sam is, the same charming, confident man she knew, but even more alluring than she remembered. Forced to confront the man who betrayed her, Tate must ask herself if it’s possible to do the wrong thing for the right reason… and whether “once in a lifetime” can come around twice.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Cancer
  • Death of a grandparent recounted
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