The Obsession by Nora Roberts

The Obsession by Nora Roberts

Naomi Bowes lost her innocence the night she followed her father into the woods. In freeing the girl trapped in the root cellar, Naomi revealed the horrible extent of her father’s crimes and made him infamous. No matter how close she gets to happiness, she can’t outrun the sins of Thomas David Bowes.

Now a successful photographer living under the name Naomi Carson, she has found a place that calls to her, a rambling old house in need of repair, thousands of miles away from everything she’s ever known. Naomi wants to embrace the solitude, but the kindly residents of Sunrise Cove keep forcing her to open up—especially the determined Xander Keaton… Read more.

.GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Rape
  • Murder
  • Kidnapping
  • Stalking

The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August by Claire North

The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August by Claire North

Some stories cannot be told in just one lifetime. Harry August is on his deathbed. Again. No matter what he does or the decisions he makes, when death comes, Harry always returns to where he began, a child with all the knowledge of a life he has already lived a dozen times before. Nothing ever changes. Until now. As Harry nears the end of his eleventh life, a little girl appears at his bedside. “I nearly missed you, Doctor August,” she says. “I need to send a message.” This is the story of what Harry does next, and what he did before, and how he tries to save a past he cannot change and a future he cannot allow.

.GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Rape
  • Suicide
  • Overdose
  • Medical experimentation
  • Cancer
  • AIDS
  • Infanticide
  • Torture, on-page
  • Incarceration

Kushiel’s Dart by Jacqueline Carey 

Kushiel’s Dart by Jacqueline Carey

The land of Terre d’Ange is a place of unsurpassing beauty and grace. It is said that angels found the land and saw it was good… and the ensuing race that rose from the seed of angels and men live by one simple rule: Love as thou wilt.

Phèdre nó Delaunay is a young woman who was born with a scarlet mote in her left eye. Sold into indentured servitude as a child, her bond is purchased by Anafiel Delaunay, a nobleman with very a special mission… and the first one to recognize who and what she is: one pricked by Kushiel’s Dart, chosen to forever experience pain and pleasure as one.

Phèdre is trained equally in the courtly arts and the talents of the bedchamber, but, above all, the ability to observe, remember, and analyze… Read more.

.GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Slavery
  • Rape
  • Paedophilia
  • Child abuse
  • Blood depiction
  • Murder
  • Torture
  • Animal death

This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone

This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar & Max Gladstone

Among the ashes of a dying world, an agent of the Commandant finds a letter. It reads: Burn before reading.

Thus begins an unlikely correspondence between two rival agents hellbent on securing the best possible future for their warring factions. Now, what began as a taunt, a battlefield boast, grows into something more. Something epic. Something romantic. Something that could change the past and the future.

Except the discovery of their bond would mean death for each of them. There’s still a war going on, after all. And someone has to win that war. That’s how war works. Right?

.GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Self-harm
  • Graphic blood & gore depiction
  • Dead bodies and body parts
  • Blood-drinking
  • Murder & attempted murder
  • Gun violence
  • Poisoning
  • Torture
  • Imprisonment
  • Animal death
  • War themes

How the King of Elfhame Learned to Hate Stories by Holly Black

How the King of Elfhame Learned to Hate Stories by Holly Black and illustrated by Rovina Cai

Before he was a cruel prince or a wicked king, he was a faerie child with a heart of stone. Revealing a deeper look into the dramatic life of Elfhame’s enigmatic high king, Cardan, his tale includes delicious details of life before The Cruel Prince, an adventure beyond The Queen of Nothing, and familiar moments from The Folk of the Air trilogy, told wholly from Cardan’s perspective.

This new instalment in the Folk of the Air series is a return to the heart-racing romance, danger, humour, and drama that enchanted readers everywhere. Each chapter is paired with lavish and luminous full-colour art, making this the perfect collector’s item to be enjoyed by both new audiences and old.

.GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Child abuse & neglect
  • Parental abandonment
  • Cheating
  • Alcohol consumption & abuse
  • Recreational drug use, including forced & coerced use
  • Whipping mentioned
  • Loss of autonomy (mind control)
  • Murder mentioned
  • Bullying

This Savage Song by Victoria Schwab

This Savage Song by Victoria Schwab

Kate Harker and August Flynn are the heirs to a divided city—a city where the violence has begun to breed actual monsters. All Kate wants is to be as ruthless as her father, who lets the monsters roam free and makes the humans pay for his protection. All August wants is to be human, as good-hearted as his own father, to play a bigger role in protecting the innocent—but he’s one of the monsters. One who can steal a soul with a simple strain of music. When the chance arises to keep an eye on Kate, who’s just been kicked out of her sixth boarding school and returned home, August jumps at it. But Kate discovers August’s secret, and after a failed assassination attempt the pair must flee for their lives.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Domestic violence
  • Suicide & attempted suicide
  • Blood depiction
  • Death of a parent
  • Murder & attempted murder
  • Mass shooting
  • Torture
  • Physical assault
  • Car accident
  • Arson

The Last House Guest by Megan Miranda

The Last House Guest by Megan Miranda

The summer after a wealthy young summer guest dies under suspicious circumstances, her best friend lives under a cloud of grief and suspicion. Littleport, Maine, has always felt like two separate towns: an ideal vacation enclave for the wealthy, whose summer homes line the coastline; and a simple harbour community for the year-round residents whose livelihoods rely on service to the visitors.

Typically, fierce friendships never develop between a local and a summer girl—but that’s just what happens with visitor Sadie Loman and Littleport resident Avery Greer. Each summer for almost a decade, the girls are inseparable—until Sadie is found dead. While the police rule the death a suicide, Avery can’t help but feel there are those in the community, including a local detective and Sadie’s brother, Parker, who blame her. Someone knows more than they’re saying, and Avery is intent on clearing her name, before the facts get twisted against her.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Murder
  • Car accident
  • House fire

Force of Nature by Jane Harper 

Force of Nature by Jane Harper

The hike through the rugged Giralang Ranges is meant to take the office colleagues out of their air-conditioned comfort zone and encourage teamwork and resilience. At least, that’s what the corporate retreat website advertises.

Federal Police investigator Aaron Falk has a keen interest in the whereabouts of the missing hiker, Alice Russell. Because Alice knew secrets, about the company she worked for and the people she worked with.

The four returning women tell Falk a tale of fear, violence and fractured trust during their days in the remote Australian bushland. And as Falk delves into the disappearance of Alice, he begins to suspect some dangers ran far deeper than anyone knew.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Fatmisia & body shaming
  • Cheating, on-page
  • Revenge pornography of a minor discussed
  • Alcohol consumption, on-page
  • Alcoholism & substance addiction discussed
  • Drug use & abuse recounted
  • Graphic smoking, on-page
  • Eating disorder and disordered food & weight thoughts, on-page
  • Abortion & miscarriage mentioned
  • Blood & injury depiction, including a fractured wrist, head wounds, burn scars, and hospitalisation for an infected snakebite
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a father recounted
  • Murder
  • Animal attack (snake)
  • Bullying

I Am Pilgrim by Terry Hayes

I Am Pilgrim by Terry Hayes

A young woman murdered in a run-down Manhattan hotel. A father publicly beheaded in the blistering sun of Saudi Arabia. A man’s eyes stolen from his living body as he leaves a secret Syrian research laboratory. Smouldering human remains on a mountainside in the Hindu Kush.

A plot to commit an appalling crime against humanity. One thread that binds them all. One man to take the journey.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Torture
  • Terrorism

The Princess Bride by William Goldman

The Princess Bride by William Goldman

Beautiful, flaxen-haired Buttercup has fallen for Westley, the farm boy, and when he departs to make his fortune, she vows never to love another. So when she hears that his ship has been captured by the Dread Pirate Roberts (no survivors) her heart is broken. But her charms draw the attention of the relentless Prince Humperdinck who wants a wife and will go to any lengths to have Buttercup. So starts a fairy tale like no other, of fencing, poison, true love, hate, revenge, giants, bad men, good men, snakes, spiders, chases, escapes, lies, truths, passion and miracles, and … a damn fine story.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Forced marriage
  • Physical, verbal & emotional abuse
  • Nightmares
  • Alcoholism
  • Suicide (accidental)
  • Suicidal ideation
  • Blood depiction
  • Scars
  • Murder & attempted murder
  • Torture
  • Knife violence
  • Physical assault
  • Kidnapping
  • Fire
  • Loss of autonomy
  • Hunting