Smoke by Ellen Hopkins

Smoke by Ellen Hopkins

Pattyn Von Stratten’s father is dead, and Pattyn is on the run. After far too many years of abuse at the hands of her father, and after the tragic loss of her beloved Ethan and their unborn child, Pattyn is desperate for peace. Only her sister Jackie knows what happened that fatal night, but she is stuck at home with their mother, who clings to normalcy by allowing the truth to be covered up by their domineering community leaders. Her father might be finally gone, but without Pattyn, Jackie is desperately isolated.

Alone and in disguise, Pattyn starts a new life as a migrant worker on a California ranch. But is it even possible to rebuild a life when everything you’ve known has burned to ash and lies seem far safer than the truth?

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Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Ableism & ableist language
  • Homomisia & homomisic slurs
  • Lesbomisia & lesbomisic slurs
  • Racism
  • Misogyny
  • Hate crimes discussed
  • Victim blaming
  • Slut shaming
  • Rape & attempted rape
  • Domestic abuse
  • Child abuse
  • Suicidal ideation
  • Pregnancy loss
  • Parent with alcoholism recounted
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Death of a father
  • Death of a boyfriend
  • Murder & attempted murder
  • Gun violence
  • Explosions & bombings
  • Animal death
  • Bullying
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10 Things I Can See from Here by Carrie Mac

10 Things I Can See from Here by Carrie Mac

10 Things I Can See from Here by Carrie Mac book cover

Think positive. Don’t worry; be happy. Keep calm and carry on.

Maeve has heard it all before. She’s been struggling with severe anxiety for a long time, and as much as she wishes it was something she could just talk herself out of, it’s not. She constantly imagines the worst, composes obituaries in her head, and is always ready for things to fall apart. To add to her troubles, her mom—the only one who really gets what Maeve goes through—is leaving for six months, so Maeve will be sent to live with her dad in Vancouver.

Vancouver brings a slew of new worries, but Maeve finds brief moments of calm (as well as even more worries) with Salix, a local girl who doesn’t seem to worry about anything. Between her dad’s wavering sobriety, her very pregnant stepmom insisting on a home birth, and her bumbling courtship with Salix, this summer brings more catastrophes than even Maeve could have foreseen. Will she be able to navigate through all the chaos to be there for the people she loves?

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Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Bimisia
  • Lesbomisia
  • Sexual assault, specifically nonconsensual kiss
  • Anxiety and anxiety attacks
  • Alcoholism
  • Suicide
  • Drug abuse
  • Drug addiction, including relapse/s
  • Childbirth
  • Death of a friend
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A Darkly Beating Heart by Lindsay Smith

A Darkly Beating Heart by Lindsay Smith

No one knows what to do with Reiko. She is full of hatred. All she can think about is how to best hurt herself and the people closest to her. After a failed suicide attempt, Reiko’s parents send her from their Seattle home to spend the summer with family in Japan to learn to control her emotions. But while visiting Kuramagi, a historic village preserved to reflect the nineteenth-century Edo period, Reiko finds herself slipping back in time into the life of Miyu, a young woman even more bent on revenge than Reiko herself. Reiko loves being Miyu, until she discovers the secret of Kuramagi village, and must face down Miyu’s demons as well as her own.

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Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Lesbomisia
  • Misogyny
  • Depression
  • Self harm
  • Attempted suicide
  • Suicidal ideation
  • Overdose mentioned
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My Heart Goes Bang by Keris Stainton

My Heart Goes Bang by Keris Stainton

Ella, Lou, Issey, Liane and Paige are determined to make the most of this second year at uni. They want to have fun, but they want to focus on work. There’s no time for relationships. Except with each other. And even that’s not guaranteed. Gemma and Lou have always been close, but there’s tension between Issey and Liane, and none of them even knows Paige all that well.

But when Ella finds a magazine article with a list of men they should date before they’re 21 (someone who’s been on telly? Check; someone who’s got tattoos? Check;) they vow to complete the list before finishing university and set about it with a lot more enthusiasm than they do their studies … but will any of them end up with a full house? And when a secret from their first year comes out, it looks as if some of them might not be completing university, never mind the list …

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Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Ableism
  • Fatphobia & body shaming
  • Misogyny
  • Slut-shaming
  • Lesbomisia
  • Sexual harassment
  • Revenge porn
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Cancer
  • Asthma attack
  • Stalking
  • Blackmail
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Between Perfect and Real by Ray Stoeve

Between Perfect & Real by Ray Stoeve

Dean Foster knows he’s a trans guy. He’s watched enough YouTube videos and done enough questioning to be sure. But everyone at his high school thinks he’s a lesbian—including his girlfriend Zoe, and his theater director, who just cast him as a “nontraditional” Romeo. He wonders if maybe it would be easier to wait until college to come out. But as he plays Romeo every day in rehearsals, Dean realizes he wants everyone to see him as he really is now––not just on the stage, but everywhere in his life. Dean knows what he needs to do. Can playing a role help Dean be his true self?

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Transmisia
  • Lesbomisia & lesbomisic slurs
  • Outing
  • Misgendering & deadnaming
  • Gender dysphoria
  • Suicide mentioned
  • Bullying
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Music From Another World by Robin Talley

Music From Another World by Robin Talley

It’s summer 1977 and closeted lesbian Tammy Larson can’t be herself anywhere. Not at her strict Christian high school, not at her conservative Orange County church and certainly not at home, where her ultrareligious aunt relentlessly organizes antigay political campaigns. Tammy’s only outlet is writing secret letters in her diary to gay civil rights activist Harvey Milk…until she’s matched with a real-life pen pal who changes everything.

Sharon Hawkins bonds with Tammy over punk music and carefully shared secrets, and soon their letters become the one place she can be honest. The rest of her life in San Francisco is full of lies. The kind she tells for others–like helping her gay brother hide the truth from their mom–and the kind she tells herself. But as antigay fervor in America… Read more.

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Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Lesbomisia & internalied lesbomisia
  • Bullying
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Our Own Private Universe by Robin Talley

Our Own Private Universe by Robin Talley

Fifteen-year-old Aki Simon has a theory. Aki already knows she’s bisexual—even if, until now, it’s mostly been in the hypothetical sense. Aki has dated only guys so far, and her best friend, Lori, is the only person who knows she likes girls, too.

Actually, Aki’s theory is that she’s got only one shot at living an interesting life—and that means it’s time for her to actually do something. So when Aki and Lori set off on a church youth-group trip to a small Mexican town for the summer and Aki meets Christa it seems her theory is prime for the testing.

But it’s not going to be easy. For one thing, how exactly do two girls have sex, anyway? And more important, how can you tell if you’re in love?

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Ableism & ableist language
  • Racism
  • Lesbomisia
  • Bimisia
  • Poverty themes
  • Death of a relative in combat
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Lies We Tell Ourselves by Robin Talley

Lies We Tell Ourselves by Robin Talley

Sarah Dunbar is one of the first black students to attend the previously all-white Jefferson High School. An honors student at her old school, she is put into remedial classes, spit on and tormented daily.

Linda Hairston is the daughter of one of the town’s most vocal opponents of school integration. She has been taught all her life that the races should be kept separate but equal.

Forced to work together on a school project, Sarah and Linda must confront harsh truths about race, power and how they really feel about one another.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Racism (theme)
  • Internalised lesbomisia
  • Child abuse
  • Bullying
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Pulp by Robin Talley

Pulp by Robin Talley

In 1955, eighteen-year-old Janet Jones keeps the love she shares with her best friend Marie a secret. It’s not easy being gay in Washington, DC, in the age of McCarthyism, but when she discovers a series of books about women falling in love with other women, it awakens something in Janet. As she juggles a romance she must keep hidden and a newfound ambition to write and publish her own story, she risks exposing herself—and Marie—to a danger all too real.

Sixty-two years later, Abby Zimet can’t stop thinking about her senior project and its subject—classic 1950s lesbian pulp fiction. Between the pages of her favorite book, the stresses of Abby’s own life are lost to the fictional hopes, desires and tragedies of the characters she’s reading about. She feels especially connected to one author, a woman who wrote under the pseudonym “Marian Love,” and becomes determined to track her down and discover her true identity.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Racism
  • Homomisia
  • Transmisia
  • Outing mentioned
  • Suicide
  • Murder mentioned
  • Car accident mentioned
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Pretty Little Liars by Sara Shepard

Pretty Little Liars by Sara Shepard book cover

Everyone has something to hide, especially high school juniors Spencer, Aria, Emily, and Hanna. Spencer covets her sister’s boyfriend. Aria’s fantasizing about her English teacher. Emily’s crushing on the new girl at school. Hanna uses some ugly tricks to stay beautiful. But they’ve all kept an even bigger secret since their friend Alison vanished. How do I know? Because I know everything about the bad girls they were, the naughty girls they are, and the dirty secrets they’ve kept. And guess what? I’m telling.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Fatphobia &body shaming
  • Misogyny, slut-shaming, ableism & racism
  • Homophobia & lesbophobia
  • Child emotional abuse & neglect
  • Teacher-student relationship
  • Sexual harassment
  • Infidelity
  • Eating disorders (bulimia), including disordered food thoughts, binging, and purging (on-page) and discussions of weight loss
  • Self-harm mentioned
  • Alcohol consumption & recreational drug use
  • Murder
  • Stalking & blackmail (theme)
  • Car accident
  • Bullying