Tag Archives: Drug Use & Abuse

This page lists books that contain trigger warnings for the depiction of both recreational drug use and drug abuse.

See also Overdose and Alcohol consumption. For drug addiction, see Substance addiction and Alcoholism. For involuntary drug use, see Drugging

False Hearts by Laura Lam

Raised in the closed cult of Mana’s Hearth and denied access to modern technology, conjoined sisters Taema and Tila dream of a life beyond the walls of the compound. When the heart they share begins to fail, the twins escape to San Francisco, where they are surgically separated and given new artificial hearts. From then on they pursue lives beyond anything they could have previously imagined. Ten years later, Tila returns one night to the  twins’ home in the city, terrified and covered in blood, just before the police arrive and arrest her for murder–the first… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Surgery to separate conjoined twins due to heart failure recounted (protagonist)
  • Psychedelic, mind-altering drug use discussed
  • Blood depiction
  • Organised crime
  • Cult recounted

Fallen Star by Susannah Nix

Scott Deacon was one of the most bankable stars in Hollywood until his drug abuse and out-of-control behavior brought it all crashing down. Four years after flaming out, he’s clean, sober, and trying to revive his career. But what he needs is to warm up the beautiful yet chilly script supervisor who won’t cut him a break. Grace Speer doesn’t think much of Scotty Deacon. He may be sex on wheels, but the man is 100% bad news. Beneath the handsome facade, he’s just another arrogant jackass determined to make her life more difficult. Only the more time they spend… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Substance addiction & recovery
  • Drug abuse

The Fall of the Hotel Dumort by Cassandra Claire and Maureen Johnson

Magnus Bane watches the once-glamorous Hotel Dumort become something else altogether in 1970s New York City. Fifty years after the Jazz Age rise of the Hotel Dumort, immortal warlock Magnus Bane knows the Manhattan landmark is on the decline. The once-beautiful Hotel Dumort has fallen into a decayed thing, a ruin, as dead as a place can be. But the vampires don’t mind…

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Drug use & abuse
  • Substance addiction
  • Blood depiction
  • Dead bodies
  • Murder

The Fall of Iris Henley by Jennifer Graham

All it takes to ruin someone’s life is the stroke of a key. Just ask Iris Henley. Her life is destroyed when someone posts an anonymous message on her high school’s subreddit thread: “Iris Henley is a killer. I’ve been too scared to come forward until now, but I saw her murder Rocky and Lynette last summer.” Just like that, Iris loses everything. Her reputation. Her friends. Her hope of getting into college on scholarship. Even, possibly, her freedom, once the police start to investigate. After all, she’s the perfect suspect: Rocky was her boyfriend, and Lynette was her ex-best friend—and… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Toxic friendship
  • Suicide mentioned
  • Alcohol consumption & drug abuse
  • Murder
  • Kidnapping mentioned
  • Bullying & cyberbullying
  • Stalking mentioned

Fake Skating by Lynn Painter

From play dates on the playground to sneaking into movie theatres, Dani and Alec were inseparable as kids. Until Dani moved away. Years later, Dani is back in Minnesota, and exited to reconnect with the nerdy and comforting Alec. But teenage Alec is NOTHING like the boy she remembers. He’s the hockey STAR in a town where hockey players are worshipped as gods—and he loves it. When one thing leads to another and Dani and Alec find themselves thrown together and playing the role of boyfriend and girlfriend, “complicated” becomes an understatement. In this Minnesota… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Parental abandonment
  • Parental divorce mentioned
  • Anxiety attack (on-page)
  • Alcohol consumption & drug use
  • Hospitalisation for sports injury
  • Physical assault
  • Car accident recounted

The Fake Boyfriend Fiasco by Talia Hibbert

For millionaire footballer Nikolas Christou, one look is all it takes. The minute he sees Aria Granger, he’s a goner. Playboy Nik knows lust—intimately—but his need for Aria goes far beyond that. Of course, the plus-sized beauty isn’t interested in romance… but Nik isn’t interested in giving up. Aria Granger has sworn off relationships for her own good. After all, her ex nearly murdered her best friend, so clearly her taste is questionable. When charming, gorgeous Nik bounds into her life, Aria can’t decide if he’s as innocent as he seems… or if her bullshit-ometer is… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Biphobia
  • Alcohol consumption & drug use recounted
  • Kidnapping & stalking mentioned
  • Explosion recounted

Saint Iggy by K.L. Going

When Iggy Corso gets kicked out of high school, there’s no one for him to tell. His mother has gone off, his father is stoned on the couch, and the phone’s been disconnected, so even the social worker can’t get through. Leaving his public housing behind, Iggy ventures into the world to make something of his life. It’s not easy when you’re sixteen, have no skills, and your only friend is mixed up with the dealer who got your mom hooked. But Iggy is . . . Iggy, and he has the kind of wisdom that lets him see what no one else can.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Parental abandonment & neglect
  • Infidelity
  • Parent with substance addiction
  • Alcohol consumption and recreational drug use & abuse
  • Murder
  • Gun violence
  • Police brutality

The Safe Place by Anna Downes

Emily Proudman has been offered the chance of a lifetime – leave her messy London life, move to a beautiful estate in France and help her boss’s wife take care of their daughter. It seems like the perfect opportunity to start again. But once there, Emily soon starts to suspect that her charismatic new employers aren’t telling her the whole truth. That there are even dangerous secrets hidden beneath the glamorous facade. Why have the family been moved to this isolated house so far from home? Why does her boss’s daughter refuse to speak or be touched?… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Foster care experiences mentioned
  • Child abuse, including one slap scene, faking a child’s chronic illness, and forcing them to live in isolation (etc.)
  • Discussions of childhood trauma and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (c-PTSD)
  • Parent with dementia
  • Panic attacks
  • Self-harm (on-page)
  • Suicide by jumping (on-page)
  • Alcohol consumption & abuse and implied drug abuse
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a daughter recounted
  • Minor blood & injury depiction and emesis
  • Attempted murder by gun violence
  • Kidnapping and captivity of a child
  • Stalking
  • Financial difficulties discussed

A Safe Girl to Love: Stories by Casey Plett

Eleven unique short stories that stretch from a rural Canadian Mennonite town to a hipster gay bar in Brooklyn, featuring young trans women stumbling through loss, sex, harassment, and love. These stories, shiny with whiskey and prairie sunsets, rattling subways and neglected cats, show growing up as a trans girl can be charming, funny, frustrating, or sad, but never will it be predictable.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Homophobia & transphobia
  • Sexual assault
  • Depression
  • Attempted suicide recounted & self-harm
  • Alcohol consumption, drug use & smoking

Soul Searching by Lyla Sage

Collins Cartwright does not want to go home. Sweetwater Peak, Wyoming, was supposed to be in her rearview mirror, but when she finds out a developer is trying to buy her parents’ antiques shop out from under them, she doesn’t have a choice—at least, that’s what she tells her family. They don’t need to know she’s lost her job and is out of money. Or that the ghosts who have always been her companions have recently gone silent. But just because she’s returned home doesn’t mean she has to stay with her parents or crash on her twin sister’s couch. Lucky for her, the new…. Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Depression
  • Drug use
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Car accident recounted
  • Animal death recounted (off-page)