In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado

In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado

In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado book cover

For years Carmen Maria Machado has struggled to articulate her experiences in an abusive same-sex relationship. In this extraordinarily candid and radically inventive memoir, Machado tackles a dark and difficult subject with wit, inventiveness and an inquiring spirit, as she uses a series of narrative tropes—including classic horror themes—to create an entirely unique piece of work which is destined to become an instant classic.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Body-shaming
  • Intimate partner violence, domestic abuse/violence, toxic relationship/s, cheating and emotional abuse
  • Sexual assault, sexual abuse and adult-minor relationship
  • Recreational marijuana use
  • Emesis
  • Suicidal ideation
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Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado

Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado

Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado book cover

In Her Body and Other Parties, Carmen Maria Machado blithely demolishes the arbitrary borders between psychological realism and science fiction, comedy and horror, fantasy and fabulism. While her work has earned her comparisons to Karen Russell and Kelly Link, she has a voice that is all her own. In this electric and provocative debut, Machado bends genre to shape startling narratives that map the realities of women’s lives and the violence visited upon their bodies.

A wife refuses her husband’s entreaties to remove the green ribbon from around her neck. A woman recounts her sexual encounters as a plague slowly consumes humanity. A salesclerk in a mall makes a horrifying discovery within the seams of the store’s prom dresses. One woman’s surgery-induced weight loss results in an unwanted houseguest. And in the bravura novella Especially Heinous, Machado reimagines every episode of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, a show we naively assumed had shown it all, generating a phantasmagoric police procedural full of doppelgangers, ghosts, and girls with bells for eyes.

Earthy and otherworldly, antic and sexy, queer and caustic, comic and deadly serious, Her Body and Other Parties swings from horrific violence to the most exquisite sentiment. In their explosive originality, these stories enlarge the possibilities of contemporary fiction.

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Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Misogyny
  • Rape
  • Child abuse and domestic violence
  • Abortion and miscarriage
  • Emesis, blood and gore depiction
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The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

It is 1939. Nazi Germany. The country is holding its breath. Death has never been busier, and will be busier still.

By her brother’s graveside, Liesel’s life is changed when she picks up a single object, partially hidden in the snow. It is The Gravedigger’s Handbook, left behind there by accident, and it is her first act of book thievery. So begins a love affair with books and words, as Liesel, with the help of her accordian-playing foster father, learns to read. Soon she is stealing books from Nazi book-burnings, the mayor’s wife’s library, wherever there are books to be found.

But these are dangerous times. When Liesel’s foster family hides a Jew in their basement, Liesel’s world is both opened up, and closed down.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Racism, including blackface, and antiziganism (g slur)
  • Anti-semitism and Nazism (theme)
  • Ableism & ableist language
  • Parental abandonment & verbal abuse
  • PTSD & nightmares
  • Recreational drug use (smoking)
  • Emesis
  • Starvation
  • Gore depiction (dead bodies)
  • Death of a brother
  • Death of a child
  • Death of a father & uncle mentioned
  • Murder
  • Explosions, including air raids, and fire
  • Death by exposure to the cold
  • War themes* and battle scenes
  • Poverty themes
  • Bullying

*Set during WWII and discussed the Holocaust.

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The Weight of Our Sky by Hanna Alkaf

The Weight of Our Sky by Hanna Alkaf

Melati Ahmad looks like your typical moviegoing, Beatles-obsessed sixteen-year-old. Unlike most other sixteen-year-olds though, Mel also believes that she harbors a djinn inside her, one who threatens her with horrific images of her mother’s death unless she adheres to an elaborate ritual of counting and tapping to keep him satisfied.

But there are things that Melati can’t protect her mother from. On the evening of May 13th, 1969, racial tensions in her home city of Kuala Lumpur boil over. The Chinese and Malays are at war, and Mel and her mother become separated by a city in flames.

With a 24-hour curfew in place and all lines of communication down, it will take the help of a Chinese boy named Vincent and all of the courage and grit in Melati’s arsenal to overcome the violence on the streets, her own prejudices, and her djinn’s surging power to make it back to the one person she can’t risk losing.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Ableism, internalised ableism & ableist language
  • Racism & race riots (theme)
  • Anxiety & panic attacks
  • OCD & intrusive thoughts (protagonist)
  • Hospital
  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Emesis
  • Death of a mother discussed
  • Murder & attempted murder
  • Knife violence
  • Fire & being burned alive
  • Hostage situation
  • Displacement & homelessness
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The Bromance Book Club by Lyssa Kay Adams

The Bromance Book Club by Lyssa Kay Adams

Nashville Legends second baseman Gavin Scott’s marriage is in major league trouble. He’s recently discovered a humiliating secret: his wife Thea has always faked the Big O. When he loses his cool at the revelation, it’s the final straw on their already strained relationship. Thea asks for a divorce, and Gavin realizes he’s let his pride and fear get the better of him.

Distraught and desperate, Gavin finds help from an unlikely source: a secret romance book club made up of Nashville’s top alpha men. With the help of their current read, a steamy Regency titled Courting the Countess, the guys coach Gavin on saving his marriage. But it’ll take a lot more than flowery words and grand gestures for this hapless Romeo to find his inner hero and win back the trust of his wife.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Parental abuse & neglect recounted
  • Miscarriage mentioned
  • Emesis
  • Alcohol consumption
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Burn Our Bodies Down by Rory Power

Burn Our Bodies Down by Rory Power

Burn Our Bodies Down by Rory Power book cover

Ever since Margot was born, it’s been just her and her mother. No answers to Margot’s questions about what came before. No history to hold on to. No relative to speak of. Just the two of them, stuck in their run-down apartment, struggling to get along.

But that’s not enough for Margot. She wants a family. She wants a past. And she just found the key she needs to get it: A photograph, pointing her to a town called Phalene. Pointing her home. Only, when Margot gets there, it’s not what she bargained for. Margot’s mother left for a reason. But was it to hide her past? Or was it to protect Margot from what’s still there?

The only thing Margot knows for sure is there’s poison in their family tree, and their roots are dug so deeply into Phalene that now that she’s there, she might never escape. 

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Emotional parental abuse & gaslighting
  • Nonconsensual pregnancy
  • Blood and gore depiction
  • Body horror
  • Dead body
  • Emesis mentioned
  • Death of an infant, off-page
  • Gun violence, off-page
  • Fire

Summer of Salt by Katrina Leno

Summer of Salt by Katrina Leno

Summer of Salt by Kartina Leno book cover

A magic passed down through generations . . . Georgina Fernweh waits with growing impatience for the tingle of magic in her fingers—magic that has been passed down through every woman in her family. Her twin sister, Mary, already shows an ability to defy gravity. But with their eighteenth birthday looming at the end of this summer, Georgina fears her gift will never come.

An island where strange things happen . . . No one on the island of By-the-Sea would ever call the Fernwehs what they really are, but if you need the odd bit of help—say, a sleeping aid concocted by moonlight—they are the ones to ask. No one questions the weather, as moody and erratic as a summer storm… Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Ableist language
  • Slut-shaming
  • Victim-blaming
  • Rape, off-page
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Childbirth & pregnancy mentioned
  • Physical illness
  • Emesis
  • Hospitals
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a father
  • Attempted murder
  • Physical assault
  • Gun violence
  • Animal cruelty & death, off-page
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The Year of the Witching by Alexis Henderson

The Year of the Witching by Alexis Henderson

The daughter of a union with an outsider that cast her once-proud family into disgrace, Immanuelle does her best to worship the Father, follow Holy Protocol and lead a life of submission, devotion and absolute conformity, like all the women in the settlement.

But a chance mishap lures her into the forbidden Darkwood that surrounds Bethel – a place where the first prophet once pursued and killed four powerful witches. Their spirits are still walking there, and they bestow a gift on Immanuelle: the diary of her dead mother, who Immanuelle is shocked to learn once sought sanctuary in the wood.

Fascinated by secrets in the diary, Immanuelle finds herself struggling to understand how her mother could have consorted with the witches. But when she begins to learn grim truths about the Church and its history, she realises the true threat to Bethel is its own darkness. And if Bethel is to change, it must begin with her . . .

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Racism & colourism
  • Misogyny
  • Slut-shaming
  • Ableist language
  • Persecution for witchcraft
  • Physical, verbal & emotional child abuse
  • Sexual assault
  • Rape & statutory rape recounted
  • Paedophilia & child molestation recounted
  • Forced nonconsensual marriage*
  • Exile & ex-communication
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Suicide recounted
  • Self-harm & self-inflicted injuries
  • Pregnancy & child pregnancy (secondary character)
  • Death from childbirth (two on-page scenes), and mentions of miscarriage & stillbirth
  • Graphic blood depiction & menstruation discussed
  • Plague (multiple)
  • Seizures & stroke (side character)
  • Nonconsensual branding
  • Emesis
  • Death of a mother & father recounted
  • Death of a son recounted
  • Death of a best friend (on-page)
  • Strangulation
  • Drowning
  • Being burned alive
  • Earthquake
  • Imprisonment & captivity
  • Murder & attempted murder
  • Knife violence & stabbing
  • Animal death & sacrifice

Note: This book portrays a cult which uses its beliefs to justify abuse, torture, misogyny, racism & paedophilia, including the marriage, rape (‘bedding’) & impregnation of multiple children (not graphic or on-page, but mentioned & discussed by secondary characters).

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Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo

Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo

Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo book cover

Ketterdam: a bustling hub of international trade where anything can be had for the right price—and no one knows that better than criminal prodigy Kaz Brekker. Kaz is offered a chance at a deadly heist that could make him rich beyond his wildest dreams. But he can’t pull it off alone. A convict with a thirst for revenge. A sharpshooter who can’t walk away from a wager. A runaway with a privileged past. A spy known as the Wraith. A Heartrender using her magic to survive the slums. A thief with a gift for unlikely escapes. Kaz’s crew is the only thing that might stand between the world and destruction—if they don’t kill each other first.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Ableism & ableist language
  • Persecution for ‘witchcraft’ (theme)
  • Indentured servitude and slavery
  • Forced underaged sex work recounted
  • Child abuse recounted
  • Disownment
  • Substance and gambling addiction
  • Nightmares
  • Coerced suicide (implied)
  • Alcohol consumption, recreational drug use & non-consensual drugging including forced and coerced drug dependency
  • Blood, gore & injury depiction including dead bodies, emesis, medical experimentation, plague, eyeball trauma, and non-consensual body modifications
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a father & brother recounted
  • Death of a friend
  • Murder & attempted murder
  • Physical assault
  • Knife and gun violence
  • Torture
  • Strangulation
  • Explosions
  • Kidnapping and captivity
  • Incarceration
  • Drowning
  • Animal death
  • Animal attack & death by an animal attack
  • Bullying

Yes No Maybe So by Becky Albertalli & Aisha Saeed

Yes No Maybe So by Becky Albertalli & Aisha Saeed

Yes No Maybe So by Becky Albertalli and Aisha Saeed book cover

Jamie Goldberg is cool with volunteering for his local state senate candidate—as long as he’s behind the scenes. When it comes to speaking to strangers (or, let’s face it, speaking at all to almost anyone), Jamie’s a choke artist. There’s no way he’d ever knock on doors to ask people for their votes…until he meets Maya. Maya Rehman’s having the worst Ramadan ever. Her best friend is too busy to hang out, her summer trip is canceled, and now her parents are separating. Why her mother thinks the solution to her problems is political canvassing—with some awkward dude she… Read more.

Goodreads

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Misogyny
  • Racism, islamophobia & antisemitism
  • Hate crimes (off-page)
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Emesis recounted
  • Death of a grandfather recounted
  • Cyberharassment

Context : A secondary character takes pictures of the protagonists almost kissing and posts them online without their consent. This is discussed in-depth.