Death of a Parent & Guardian – Page 178

Not a Drop to Drink by Mindy McGinnis

Not a Drop to Drink by Mindy McGinnis

Lynn knows every threat to her pond: drought, a snowless winter, coyotes, and, most importantly, people looking for a drink. She makes sure anyone who comes near the pond leaves thirsty, or doesn’t leave at all.

Confident in her own abilities, Lynn has no use for the world beyond the nearby fields and forest. Having a life means dedicating it to survival, and the constant work of gathering wood and water. Having a pond requires the fortitude to protect it, something…. Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Ableism
Rape & attempted rape recounted
Forced sex work, off-page
Child abuse
Intimate partner violence recounted
Suicide, on-page
Suicidal ideation
Pregnancy & childbirth, on-page
Stillbirth, on-page
Blood & gore depiction, including dead bodies
Graphic physical injuries & illness, including cholera, seizures, and fever
Field surgery
Syringes and needles
Grief & loss depiction
Death of a mother & father
Death of a brother
Murder & attempted murder
Gun & knife violence
Torture
Kidnapping & hostage situation
Blackmail
Fire
Drought
Death from starvation & dehydration
Death from exposure
Military deployment recounted
Animal death & death of a pet, on-page
Animal cruelty
Hunting & animal dead bodies

In This Iron Ground by Marina Vivancos

In This Iron Ground by Marina Vivancos

Damien is nine years old when his parents die. What should have been the worst moment of his life begins a journey shadowed by loneliness and pain. The night of a full moon, four years and seven foster homes later, Damien flees to the forest, desperate to escape everything.

Instead, he finds the Salgado pack. Damien is suddenly introduced into a world that had only ever existed in his imagination, where there is magic in the forest and the moon… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Emotional & physical child abuse
Death of parents recounted

Neverland by Margot McGovern

Neverland by Margot McGovern

When she was twelve, Kit Learmonth watched her parents drown in a storm as their boat sailed over the Tranter Sink Hole. Now seventeen, Kit doesn’t remember the incident, and she doesn’t want to. In fact, her only clear memories from before her parents’ death are of the fantastical stories of pirates and mermaids that she and her dad invented about the small island where she grew up, a place she calls Neverland.

Following Kit’s parents’ deaths, her uncle and guardian, Doc, transformed the island into a boarding… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Eating disorder
Suicide discussed
Self-harm
Psychiatric treatment centre
Death of a parent recounted

Providence by Jamie McGuire

Providence by Jamie McGuire

Struggling with her father’s death, Nina meets Jared Ryel, presumably by chance. However it soon becomes clear that he knows more about her than even close friends. When her father’s former associates begin following her in the dark, Nina learns that her father was not the man she thought he was, but a thief who stole from demons. In searching for the truth behind her father’s death, she stumbles upon something she never expected, and something Hell wants, that only she holds the key for. Jared risks everything to keep the women he was born to save, by sharing the secret he was sworn to protect.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Death of a father

Every Heart a Doorway by Seanan McGuire

Every Heart a Doorway by Seanan McGuire

Ever Heart a Doorway by Seanan McGuire book cover

Children have always disappeared under the right conditions; slipping through the shadows under a bed or at the back of a wardrobe, tumbling down rabbit holes and into old wells, and emerging somewhere… else. But magical lands have little need for used-up miracle children.

Nancy tumbled once, but now she’s back. The things she’s experienced… they change a person. The children under Miss West’s care understand all too well. But Nancy’s arrival marks a change at the Home… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Amisia
Transmisia
Deadnaming & misgendering
Sexism
Dieting mentioned
Blood & gore depiction
Dead bodies
Death of a parent
Death of a friend
Murder
Hostage situation
Animal death mentioned
Bullying

Beneath the Sugar Sky by Seanan McGuire

Beneath the Sugar Sky by Seanan McGuire

Beneath the Sugar Sky, the third book in McGuire’s Wayward Children series, returns to Eleanor West’s Home for Wayward Children in a standalone contemporary fantasy for fans of all ages. At this magical boarding school, children who have experienced fantasy adventures are reintroduced to the “real” world.

When Rini lands with a literal splash in the pond behind Eleanor West’s Home for Wayward Children, the last thing she expects to find is that her mother, Sumi, died years before Rini was even conceived. But Rini can’t let Reality get in the way of her quest – not when she has an entire world to save! (Much more common than one would suppose.) If she can’t find a way to restore her mother, Rini will have more than a world to save: she will never have been born in the first place. And in a world without magic, she doesn’t have long before Reality notices her existence and washes her away. Good thing the student body is well-acquainted with quests…

A tale of friendship, baking, and derring-do. Warning: May contain nuts.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Fatmisia
Transmisia
Racism mentioned
Misgendering
Eating disorders mentioned
Death of a parent
Torture
Kidnapping & captivity

Mooncakes by Suzanne Walker and Wendy Xu

Mooncakes by Suzanne Walker & Wendy Xu

Nova Huang knows more about magic than your average teen witch. She works at her grandmothers’ bookshop, where she helps them loan out spell books and investigate any supernatural occurrences in their New England town.

One fateful night, she follows reports of a white wolf into the woods, and she comes across the unexpected: her childhood crush, Tam Lang, battling a horse demon in the woods. As a werewolf, Tam has been wandering from place to place for years, unable to call any town home.

Pursued by dark forces eager to claim the magic of wolves and out of options, Tam turns to Nova for help.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Ableism mentioned
Misgendering
Child abuse
Minor physical injuries
Death of a mother & father
Kidnapping & captivity
Cults
Animal abuse
Homelessness

Stargazing by Jen Wang

Stargazing by Jen Wang

When Moon’s family moves in next door to Christine’s, Moon goes from unlikely friend to best friend―maybe even the perfect friend. The girls share their favorite music videos, paint their toenails when Christine’s strict parents aren’t around, and make plans to enter the school talent show together. Moon even tells Christine her deepest secret: that she sometimes has visions of celestial beings who speak to her from the stars. Who reassure her that earth isn’t where she really belongs.

But when they’re least expecting it, catastrophe strikes. After relying on Moon for everything, can Christine find it in herself to be the friend Moon needs?

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

Colourism
Sexism
Hallucinations & delusions
Hospital
Brain tumour
Surgery
Death of a father
Bullying

We Hunt the Flame by Hafsah Faizal

We Hunt the Flame by Hafsah Faizal

Zafira is the Hunter, disguising herself as a man when she braves the cursed forest of the Arz to feed her people. Nasir is the Prince of Death, assassinating those foolish enough to defy his autocratic father, the sultan. If Zafira was exposed as a girl, all of her achievements would be rejected; if Nasir displayed his compassion, his father would punish him in the most brutal of ways. Both Zafira and Nasir are legends in the kingdom of Arawiya–but neither wants to be. War is brewing, and the Arz sweeps closer with each passing day, engulfing the land in shadow. When Zafira embarks on a quest to uncover a lost artifact that can restore… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

Ableism & misogyny
Child emotional and verbal abuse & neglect
Blood, gore & injury depiction including dead bodies
Grief & loss depiction
Death of a mother & father
Death of a child
Death of a friend
Death of a cousin
Murder & attempted murder
Torture
Imprisonment & captivity
Kidnapping & blackmail
War themes discussed
Animal death & hunting

The Wicked Deep by Shea Ernshaw

The Wicked Deep by Shea Ernshaw

Where, two centuries ago, three sisters were sentenced to death for witchery. Stones were tied to their ankles and they were drowned in the deep waters surrounding the town. Now, for a brief time each summer, the sisters return, stealing the bodies of three weak-hearted girls so that they may seek their revenge, luring boys into the harbor and pulling them under. Like many locals, seventeen-year-old Penny Talbot has accepted the fate of the town. But this year, on the eve of the sisters’ return, a boy named Bo Carter arrives; unaware of the danger he has just stumbled into. Mistrust and lies spread quickly through the salty, rain… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

Ableist language
Misogyny & slut-shaming
Persecution for witchcraft
Dubious consent scenes & sexual assault (non-consensual kiss) (on-page)
Suicide & self-sacrifice (on-page, discussed)
Alcohol consumption
Injury & gore depiction including dead bodies
Grief & loss depiction
Death of a brother
Death of a father & husband
Death of a fiancé
Murder & kidnapping
Drowning (multiple scenes, on-page & recounted)
Fire

Context : The protagonist lies to her love interest about her identity and they have sex (on-page).