Drug Use & Abuse – Page 45 – Trigger Warning Database

Better Than the Movies by Lynn Painter

Better Than the Movies by Lynn Painter

Liz Buxbaum has always known that Wes Bennett was not boyfriend material. You would think that her next-door neighbour would be a prince candidate for her romantic comedy fantasies, but Wes has only proven himself to be a pain in the butt, ever since they were little. Wes was the kid who put a frog in her Barbie Dreamhouse, the monster who hid a lawn gnome’s severed head in her little homemade neighbourhood book exchange. Flash forward ten years from the Great Gnome Decapitation. It’s Liz’s senior year… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Alcohol consumption
Smoking
Emesis
Grief & loss depiction
Death of a mother in a car accident mentioned
Bullying

Alone with You in the Ether by Olivie Blake

Alone with You in the Ether by Olivie Blake

Two people meet in the Art Institute by chance. Prior to their encounter, he is a doctoral student who manages his destructive thoughts with compulsive calculations about time travel; she is a bipolar counterfeit artist, undergoing court-ordered psychotherapy. By the end of the story, these things will still be true. But this is not a story about endings. For Regan, people are predictable and tedious, including and perhaps especially herself. She copes with the dreariness of existence by living impulsively, imagining a new, alternate timeline being created in the wake of every rash decision… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Bipolar Disorder
Substance addiction
Drug use & abuse
Overdose recounted

About a Boy by Nick Hornby

About a Boy by Nick Hornby

Too cool! At thirty-six, he’s as hip as a teenager. He’s single, child-free, goes to the right clubs and knows which trainers to wear. He’s also found a great way to score with women: attend single parents’ groups full of available (and grateful) mothers, all hoping to meet a Nice Guy. Which is how Will meets Marcus, the oldest twelve-year-old on the planet. Marcus is a bit strange: he listens to Joni Mitchell and Mozart, looks after his mum and has never owned a pair of trainers. But Marcus latches on to Will – and won’t let go. Can Will teach Marcus how to grow up cool? And can Marcus help Will just to grow up?

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Suicide
Recreational drug use
Bullying

Running Girl by Simon Mason

Running Girl by Simon Mason

Meet Garvie Smith. Highest IQ ever recorded at Marsh Academy. Lowest ever grades. What’s the point, anyway? Life sucks. Nothing ever happens. Until Chloe Dow’s body is pulled from a pond. DI Singh is already on the case. Ambitious, uptight, methodical – he’s determined to solve the mystery and get promoted. He doesn’t need any ‘assistance’ from notorious slacker, Smith. Or does he?

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Racism
Drug & alcohol abuse
Suicide
Murder
Fire
Stalking

The Frame-Up by Meghan Scott Molin

The Frame-Up by Meghan Scott Molin

MG Martin lives and breathes geek culture. She even works as a writer for the comic book company she idolized as a kid. But despite her love of hooded vigilantes, MG prefers her comics stay on the page. But when someone in LA starts recreating crime scenes from her favourite comic book, MG is the LAPD’s best—and only—lead. She recognizes the golden arrow left at the scene as the calling card of her favourite comic book hero. The thing is…superheroes aren’t real. Are they? When too-handsome-for-his-own… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Sexism
Homomisia
Recreational drug use
Murder

On Deck by Kimberly Readnour

On Deck by Kimberly Readnour

There are two types of people in Bellow Bay. The rich.
And me, Dalton Boyd. But my baseball scholarship is my one-way ticket out of this town and away from judgmental eyes. Nothing stands in my way. That is, until a pretty blonde with the brightest blue eyes breezes into town and tilts my world. Cassie Green comes with one simple rule. Don’t fall in love. One summer is all we have. And trust me, a summer fling isn’t a problem. But there’s one small glitch in our plan.
I’ve never been one to follow the rules. Only this time, it may be me wishing I’d stuck to the plan.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Abandonment
Alcoholism
Drug abuse
Attempted shooting during a robbery

Together We Will Go by J Michael Straczynski

Together We Will Go by J. Michael Straczynski

Mark Antonelli, a failed young writer looking down the barrel at thirty, is planning a cross-country road trip. He buys a beat-up old tour bus. He hires a young army vet to drive it. He puts out an ad for others to join him along the way. But this will be a road trip like no other: His passengers are all fellow disheartened souls who have decided that this will be their final journey—upon arrival in San Francisco, they will find a cliff with an amazing view of the ocean at sunset, hit the gas, and drive out of this world. The unlikely companions… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Fatmisia
Rape
Suicide
Drug use

Thirsty by Mia Hopkins

Thirsty by Mia Hopkins

My name is Salvador Rosas. Back in the barrio, my past is written on the walls: ESHB. Short for East Side Hollenbeck, my father’s gang—my gang. Hell, it’s a family tradition, one that sent both my brothers away. They used to call me “Ghost” because I haunted people’s dreams. Now I’ve got nothing going for me except a hipster gringo mentoring me in a new career. An ex-con making craft beer? No names. Still, people in this neighbourhood look out for one another. That’s how I became Vanessa Velasco’s unwelcome tenant. Chiquita pero picosa. She’s little, but with curves so sweet they’re dangerous. I remember… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Racism
Recreational drug use
Blood & injury depiction
Hospital
Death of a mother in a car accident recounted
Death of a sister
Gang violence
Bombing

White Rabbit by Caleb Roehrig

White Rabbit by Caleb Roehrig

Rufus Holt is having the worst night of his life. It begins with the reappearance of his ex-boyfriend, Sebastian—the guy who stomped his heart out like a spent cigarette. Just as Rufus is getting ready to move on, Sebastian turns up out of the blue, saying they need to “talk.” Things couldn’t get much worse, right? But then Rufus gets a call from his sister April, begging for help. And then he and Sebastian find her, drenched in blood and holding a knife, beside the dead body of her boyfriend, Fox Whitney… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Homomisia & slurs
Racism
Rape
Drug use
Blood depiction
Murder
Gun violence
Physical assault
Arson
Bullying

The Safe Place by Anna Downes

The Safe Place by Anna Downes

Emily Proudman just lost her acting agent, her job, and her apartment in one miserable day. Scott Denny, a successful and charismatic CEO, has a problem that neither his business acumen nor vast wealth can fix. Until he meets Emily. Scott offers Emily a summer job as a housekeeper on his remote, beautiful French estate. Enchanted by his lovely wife Nina, and his eccentric young daughter, Aurelia, Emily falls headlong into this oasis of wine-soaked days by the pool. But soon Emily realizes that Scott and Nina are hiding dangerous secrets, and if she doesn’t play along, the consequences could be deadly.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

Child abuse, implied
Alcohol consumption
Drug use
Kidnapping