UnSlut: A Diary and a Memoir by Emily Lindin

UnSlut: A Diary and a Memoir by Emily Lindin

UnSlut: A Diary and a Memoir byb Emily Lindin book cover

When Emily Lindin was eleven years old, she was branded a “slut” by the rest of her classmates. For the next few years of her life, she was bullied incessantly at school, after school, and online. At the time, Emily didn’t feel comfortable confiding in her parents or in the other adults in her life. But she did keep a diary. UnSlut presents that diary, word for word, with split-page commentary to provide context and perspective. This unique diary and memoir sheds light on the important issues of sexual bullying, slut-shaming, and the murky mores of adolescent sexual development. 

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Misogyny, sexism & slut-shaming (theme)
  • Homophobia, body-shaming & ableist slurs
  • Sexual assault
  • Depression
  • Suicide & suicidal ideation
  • Self-harm mentioned, specifically cutting
  • Eating disorder mentioned (bulimia)
  • Alcohol consumption & drug use
  • Bullying

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid book cover

Aging and reclusive Hollywood movie icon Evelyn Hugo is finally ready to tell the truth about her glamorous and scandalous life. When she chooses unknown magazine reporter Monique Grant for the job, no one in the journalism community is more astounded than Monique herself. Why her? Why now? Monique is not exactly on top of the world. Her husband, David, has left her, and her career has stagnated. Regardless of why Evelyn has chosen her to write her biography, Monique is determined to use this opportunity to jumpstart her career. Summoned to Evelyn’s Upper East… Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Racism
  • Misogyny
  • Bimisia
  • Homomisia
  • Lesbomisia
  • Forced outing
  • Paedophilia
  • Rape & statutory rape
  • Sexual assault & harassment
  • Child abuse
  • Domestic abuse
  • Cheating
  • Alcoholism, secondary character
  • Drug use
  • Suicide & suicidal ideation
  • Abortion
  • Miscarriage mentioned
  • Physical injury
  • Hospitalisation
  • Terminal breast cancer
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a partner
  • Death of a child
  • Death of a friend
  • Death of parents in a car accident
  • Blackmail
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Black Water Sister by Zen Cho

Black Water Sister by Zen Cho

Jessamyn Teoh is closeted, broke and moving back to Malaysia, a country she left when she was a toddler. So when Jess starts hearing voices, she chalks it up to stress. But there’s only one voice in her head, and it claims to be the ghost of her estranged grandmother, Ah Ma. In life Ah Ma was a spirit medium, the avatar of a mysterious deity called the Black Water Sister. Now she’s determined to settle a score against a gang boss who has offended the god–and she’s decided Jess is going to help her do it.

Drawn into a world of gods, ghosts, and family secrets, Jess finds that making deals with capricious spirits is a dangerous business. As Jess fights for retribution for Ah Ma, she’ll also need to regain control of her body and destiny. If she fails, the Black Water Sister may finish her off for good.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Homomisia
  • Misogyny
  • Racism
  • Attempted rape
  • Physical abuse mentioned
  • Anxiety
  • Cancer & remission mentioned
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How It All Blew Up by Arvin Ahmadi

How It All Blew Up by Arvin Ahmadi 

Eighteen-year-old Amir Azadi always knew coming out to his Muslim family would be messy–he just didn’t think it would end in an airport interrogation room. But when faced with a failed relationship, bullies, and blackmail, running away to Rome is his only option. Right?

Soon, late nights with new friends and dates in the Sistine Chapel start to feel like second nature… until his old life comes knocking on his door. Now, Amir has to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth to a U.S. Customs officer, or risk losing his hard-won freedom.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Racism & racial profiling
  • Islamophobia
  • Homomisia
  • Coming out themes, including threatened outing
  • Blackmail
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Traffick by Ellen Hopkins

Traffick by Ellen Hopkins

In Tricks, Ellen Hopkins introduced us to five characters tackling these enormous questions: Eden, the preacher’s daughter who turns tricks in Vegas and is helped into a child prostitution rescue; Seth, the gay farm boy disowned by his father who finds himself without money or resources other than his own body; Whitney, the privileged kid coaxed into the life by a pimp and whose dreams are ruined in a heroin haze; Ginger, who runs away from home with her girlfriend and is arrested for soliciting an undercover cop; and Cody, whose gambling habit forces him into the life, but who is shot and left for dead.

And now, in Traffick, these five are faced with the toughest question of all: Is there a way out?

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Homomisia
  • Disownment
  • Sexual assault
  • Sex trafficking
  • Forced sex work
  • Substance addiction
  • Gambling addiction
  • Gun violence
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The You I’ve Never Known by Ellen Hopkins

The You I’ve Never Known by Ellen Hopkins

For as long as she can remember, it’s been just Ariel and Dad. Ariel’s mom disappeared when she was a baby. Dad says home is wherever the two of them are, but Ariel is now seventeen and after years of new apartments, new schools, and new faces, all she wants is to put down some roots. Complicating things are Monica and Gabe, both of whom have stirred a different kind of desire.

Maya’s a teenager who’s run from an abusive mother right into the arms of an older man she thinks she can trust. But now she’s isolated with a baby on the way, and life’s getting more complicated than Maya ever could have imagined… Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Ableism & ableist language
  • Queermisia
  • Racism
  • Physical & verbal child abuse
  • Emotional child abuse & gaslighting
  • Child neglect & abandonment
  • Death of a father
  • Kidnapping
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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?

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

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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Tilt by Ellen Hopkins

Tilt by Ellen Hopkins

Three teens, three stories—all interconnected through their parents’ family relationships. As the adults pull away, caught up in their own dilemmas, the lives of the teens begin to tilt….

Mikayla, almost eighteen, is over-the-top in love with Dylan, who loves her back jealously. But what happens to that love when Mikayla gets pregnant the summer before their senior year—and decides to keep the baby?

Shane turns sixteen that same summer and falls hard in love with his first boyfriend, Alex, who happens to be HIV positive… Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Ableism & ableist language (r slur)
  • Homomisia, internalised homomisia & homomisic slurs
  • Fatmisia & body shaming
  • Slut shaming
  • Rape
  • Domestic abuse recounted
  • Child abuse recounted
  • Attempted child sexual assault recounted
  • Depression
  • Attempted suicide
  • Suicidal ideation
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Recreational drug abuse
  • AIDS & HIV
  • Bullying
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Tricks by Ellen Hopkins

Tricks by Ellen Hopkins

Five teenagers from different parts of the country. Three girls. Two guys. Four straight. One gay. Some rich. Some poor. Some from great families. Some with no one at all. All living their lives as best they can, but all searching … for freedom, safety, community, family, love. What they don’t expect, though, is all that can happen when those powerful little words “I love you” are said for all the wrong reasons.

Five moving stories remain separate at first, then interweave to tell a larger, powerful story—a story about making choices, taking leaps of faith, falling down, and growing up. A story about kids figuring out what sex and love are all about, at all costs, while asking themselves, “Can I ever feel okay about myself?”

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Homomisia
  • Child abuse & neglect
  • Rape
  • Sexual assault
  • Substance addiction
  • Alcohol consumption & abuse
  • Recreational drug abuse
  • Hospitalisation
  • Murder
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Burned by Ellen Hopkins

Burned by Ellen Hopkins

It all started with a dream. Nothing exceptional, just a typical fantasy about a boy, the kind of dream that most teen girls experience. But Pattyn Von Stratten is not like most teen girls. Raised in a religious—yet abusive—family, a simple dream may not be exactly a sin, but it could be the first step toward hell and eternal damnation.

This dream is a first step for Pattyn. But is it to hell or to a better life? For the first time Pattyn starts asking questions. Questions seemingly without answers—about God, a woman’s role, sex, love—mostly love. What is it? Where is it? Will she ever experience it? Is she deserving of it? … Read more.

GoodreadsThe Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings:

  • Disownment*
  • Physical child abuse
  • Domestic abuse & violence
  • Suicide
  • Alcoholism & alcohol abuse
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Miscarriage
  • Car accident
  • Animal death & hunting

*Note: The protagonist’s half-brother is disowned by their father after he comes out as gay.

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