The Dangerous Art of Blending In by Angelo Surmelis

The Dangerous Art of Blending In by Angelo Surmelis

Seventeen-year-old Evan Panos doesn’t know where he fits in. His strict Greek mother refuses to see him as anything but a disappointment. His quiet, workaholic father is a staunch believer in avoiding any kind of conflict. And his best friend Henry has somehow become distractingly attractive over the summer.

Tired, isolated, scared—Evan’s only escape is drawing in an abandoned church that feels as lonely as he is. And, yes, he kissed one guy over the summer. But it’s his best friend Henry who’s now proving to be irresistible. It’s Henry who suddenly seems interested in being more than friends. And it’s Henry who makes him believe that he’s more than his mother’s harsh words and terrifying abuse.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Homomisia
  • Hate crimes
  • Physical & emotional child abuse (theme)
  • Depression
  • Suicidal ideation
  • Grief & loss depiction
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All This Time by Mikki Daughtry and Rachael Lippincott

All This Time by Mikki Daughtry & Rachael Lippincott

Kyle and Kimberly have been the perfect couple all through high school, but when Kimberly breaks up with him on the night of their graduation party, Kyle’s entire world upends—literally. Their car crashes and when he awakes, he has a brain injury. Kimberly is dead. And no one in his life could possibly understand.

Until Marley. Marley is suffering from her own loss, a loss she thinks was her fault. And when their paths cross, Kyle sees in her all the unspoken things he’s feeling.

As Kyle and Marley work to heal each other’s wounds, their feelings for each other grow stronger. But Kyle can’t shake the sense that he’s headed for another crashing moment that will blow up his life as soon as he’s started to put it back together.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • PTSD & trauma
  • Hospital
  • Physical injuries (brain injury)
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a girlfriend
  • Car accident
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Skim by Mariko Tamaki

Skim by Mariko Tamaki and illustrated by Jillian Tamaki

“Skim” is Kimberly Keiko Cameron, a not-slim, would-be Wiccan goth who goes to a private girls’ school. When Skim’s classmate Katie Matthews is dumped by her boyfriend, who then kills himself, the entire school goes into mourning overdrive. As concerned guidance counselors provide lectures on the “cycle of grief,” and the popular clique starts a new club (Girls Celebrate Life!) to bolster school spirit, Skim sinks into an ever-deepening depression.

And falling in love only makes things worse…

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Homomisia & homomisic slurs
  • Sexual harassment (groping)
  • Teacher-student relationship
  • Suicide
  • Grief & loss depiction (theme)
  • Death of a boyfriend
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All the Things We Never Knew by Liara Tamani

All the Things We Never Knew by Liara Tamani

From the moment Carli and Rex first locked eyes on a Texas high school basketball court, they both knew it was destiny. But can you truly love someone else if you don’t love yourself? Acclaimed author Liara Tamani’s luminous second novel explores love, family, heartbreak, betrayal, and the power of healing, in gorgeous prose that will appeal to readers of Nicola Yoon and Jacqueline Woodson.

A glance was all it took. That kind of connection, the immediate and raw understanding of another person, just doesn’t come along very often. And as rising stars on their Texas high schools’ respective basketball teams, destined for bright futures in college and beyond, it seems like a match made in heaven. But Carli and Rex have secrets. As do their families.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Ableism & ableist language
  • Cheating
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a parent
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Bone Crier’s Moon by Kathryn Purdie

Bone Crier’s Moon by Kathryn Purdie

Bone Crier's Moon by Kathryn Purdie book cover

Bone ​Criers have a sacred duty. They alone can keep the dead from preying on the living. But their power to ferry the spirits of the dead into goddess Elara’s Night Heavens or Tyrus’s Underworld comes from sacrifice. The gods demand a promise of dedication. And that promise comes at the cost of the Bone Criers’ one true love.

Ailesse has been prepared since birth to become the matriarch of the Bone Criers, a mysterious famille of women who use strengths drawn from animal bones to ferry dead souls. But first she must complete her rite of passage and kill the boy she’s also destined to love.

Bastien’s father was slain by a Bone Crier and he’s been seeking revenge ever since. Yet when he finally captures one, his vengeance will have to wait. Ailesse’s ritual has begun and now their fates are entwined—in life and in death.

Sabine has never had the stomach for the Bone Criers’ work. But when her best friend Ailesse is taken captive, Sabine will do whatever it takes to save her, even if it means defying their traditions—and their matriarch—to break the bond between Ailesse and Bastien. Before they all die.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Child abandonment
  • Pregnancy discussed
  • Blood and gore depiction
  • Dead bodies
  • Grief depiction
  • Death themes
  • Death of a father, on-page
  • Death of a mother, on-page
  • Murder
  • Attempted murder
  • Knife violence
  • Torture
  • Strangulation
  • Kidnapping
  • Captivty
  • Near-drowning incident
  • Graphic animal death
  • Graphic animal dead bodies and dismemberment
  • Hunting
  • Poverty themes
  • Child homelessness
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Rebelwing by Andrea Tang

Rebelwing by Andrea Tang

Business is booming for Prudence Wu. A black-market-media smuggler and scholarship student at the prestigious New Columbia Preparatory Academy, Pru is lucky to live in the Barricade Coalition where she is free to study, read, watch, and listen to whatever she wants. But between essays and exams, she chooses to spend her breaks sweet-talking border patrol with her best friend, Anabel, in order to sell banned media to the less fortunate citizens of the United Continental Confederacy, Inc.

When a drop-off goes awry, Pru narrowly escapes UCC enforcers to find that her rescuer is, of all things, a sentient cybernetic dragon. On the one hand, Pru is lucky not to be in prison, or worse. On the other, the dragon seems to have imprinted on her permanently, which means she has no choice but to be its pilot… Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a parent
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Days of Blood and Starlight by Laini Taylor

Days of Blood & Starlight by Laini Taylor

Once upon a time, an angel and a devil fell in love and dared to imagine a world free of bloodshed and war.

This is not that world.

Art student and monster’s apprentice Karou finally has the answers she has always sought. She knows who she is—and what she is. But with this knowledge comes another truth she would give anything to undo: She loved the enemy and he betrayed her, and a world suffered for it.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Sexual assault
  • Attempted rape
  • Nightmares
  • Suicide
  • Blood & gore depiction
  • Dead bodies & body parts
  • Physical injuries
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Murder & attempted murder
  • Imprisonment
  • War themes
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Catherine House by Elisabeth Thomas

Catherine House by Elisabeth Thomas

Catherine House is a school of higher learning like no other. Hidden deep in the woods of rural Pennsylvania, this crucible of reformist liberal arts study with its experimental curriculum, wildly selective admissions policy, and formidable endowment, has produced some of the world’s best minds. For those lucky few selected, tuition, room, and board are free. But acceptance comes with a price. Students are required to give the House three years—summers included—completely removed from the outside world. Family, friends… Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Slut shaming
  • Suicide
  • Alcohol consumption & abuse
  • Emesis
  • Medical examination
  • Human & animal medical experimentation
  • Needles
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a sister mentioned
  • Death of a best friend & classmate
  • Captivity & forced isolation
  • Animal injury & illness
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Nancy Drew: The Palace of Wisdom by Kelly Thompson

Nancy Drew: The Palace of Wisdom by Kelly Thompson & illustrated by Jenn St. Onge

Nancy Drew is seventeen and good at everything… ESPECIALLY solving crimes. But her totally-in-control-and-obviously-running-perfectly-smooth-(but-not-really) life hits a snag when a mysterious message drags her back to the hometown she left behind. There she’ll have to find out which of her friends are still her friends, which are enemies, and who exactly is trying to kill her…and (hopefully) stop them before they succeed.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Racism mentioned
  • Suicide mentioned
  • Recreational drug use
  • Hospital
  • Death of a mother recounted
  • Murder
  • Gun violence
  • Kidnapping & hostage situation
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The Rosewater Insurrection by Tade Thompson

The Rosewater Insurrection by Tade Thompson

All is quiet in the city of Rosewater as it expands on the back of the gargantuan alien Wormwood. Those who know the truth of the invasion keep the secret.

The government agent Aminat, the lover of the retired sensitive Kaaro, is at the forefront of the cold, silent conflict. She must capture a woman who is the key to the survival of the human race. But Aminat is stymied by the machinations of the Mayor of Rosewater and the emergence of an old enemy of Wormwood…

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Homomisia
  • Rape & rape camps mentioned
  • Body horror
  • Loss of limb
  • Paedophilia & child sexual assault
  • Mass murder
  • Death by fire (‘necklacing’)