Tag Archives: Racism

This page lists books that contain trigger warnings for the depiction of racism.

See also White supremacy, Islamophobia, Antisemitism, and Antiziganism.

Maybe This Time by Cara Bastone

Romance can be a little complicated when you get sucked into a wormhole. Just ask high school English teacher June Flint. One little solar flare happens and suddenly you find yourself 85 years in the future. Eighty-five years from your dream job. Your ailing mother whose only companion in this world is you. Your favorite stuffed-crust pizza from DeLucia… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Workplace homophobia & racism recounted
  • Anxiety
  • Parent with degenerative memory issues
  • Death of a parent recounted

Under the Neon Lights by Arriel Vinson

Sixteen-year-old Jaelyn Coleman lives for Saturdays at WestSide Roll, the iconic neighborhood roller rink. On these magical nights, Jae can lose herself in the music of DJ Sunny, the smell of nachos from the concession, and the crowd of some of her favorite people—old heads, dance crews, and other regulars like herself. Here, Jae and other Black teens can fully be themselves. One Saturday, as Jae skates away her worries, she crashes into the cutest boy she’s ever seen. Trey’s dimples, rich brown skin, and warm smile make it impossible for her to be mad at him… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Racism
  • Parental abandonment & divorce
  • Miscarriage motioned (off-page)
  • Police brutality mentioned
  • Gentrification discussed

Kim by Rudyard Kipling

Kipling’s epic rendition of the imperial experience in India is also his greatest long work. Two men – Kim, a boy growing into early manhood, and the lama, an old ascetic priest – are fired by a quest. Kim is white, although born in India. While he wants to play the Great Game of imperialism, he is also spiritually bound to the lama and he tries to reconcile these opposing strands. A celebration of their friendship in an often hostile environment, Kim captures the opulence of India’s exotic landscape, overlaid by the uneasy presence of the British Raj.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Racism & racial slurs
  • Recreational drug use
  • Blood depiction
  • Gun violence
  • Knife violence & stabbing
  • War themes

The Loop by Jeremy Robert Johnson

Turner Falls is a small tourist town nestled in the hills of western Oregon, the kind of town you escape to for a vacation. When an inexplicable outbreak rapidly develops, this idyllic town becomes the epicenter of an epidemic of violence as the teenaged children of several executives from the local biotech firm become ill and aggressively murderous. Suddenly the town is on edge, and Lucy and her friends must do everything it takes just to fight through the night.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Racism
  • Sexual assault mentioned
  • Child neglect
  • Suicide
  • Alcoholism
  • Drug use
  • Car accident (on-page)
  • Graphic animal death & animal abuse
  • Bullying

When Haru Was Here by Dustin Thao

After the death of his best friend, Eric Ly creates imaginary scenarios in his head to deal with his grief. Until one of them becomes real when a boy he met last summer in Japan finds his way back into his life. When he least expects it, Haru Tanaka walks into the coffee shop and sits down next to him. The only thing is, nobody else can see him. In a magical turn of events, Eric suddenly has someone to connect with, making him feel less alone in the world. But as they spend more and more time together, he begins to question what is real. When he starts losing control of the very thing that is holding him together, Eric must finally confront his reality. Even if it means losing Haru forever.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Racism
  • Sexual harassment
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Grief & loss depiction (theme)
  • Death of a friend

The Keep by Jennifer Egan

Two cousins, irreversibly damaged by a childhood prank, reunite twenty years later to renovate a medieval castle in Eastern Europe. In an environment of extreme paranoia, cut off from the outside world, the men reenact the signal event of their youth, with even more catastrophic results. And as the full horror of their predicament unfolds, a prisoner, in jail for an unnamed crime, recounts an unforgettable story that seamlessly brings the crimes of the past and present into piercing relation.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Racism & racial slurs
  • Sexual assault & harassment
  • Alcohol consumption & drug use
  • Death of a child
  • Police violence
  • Car accident
  • Bullying

The Vacation by John Marrs

Venice Beach, Los Angeles. A paradise on earth. Tourists flock to the golden coast and the promise of Hollywood. But for eight strangers at a beach-front hostel, there is far more on their minds than an extended vacation. All of them are running from something. And they all have secrets they’d kill to keep…

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Racism
  • Child abuse
  • Rape & voyeurism
  • Drug use, overdose & drugging
  • Cancer & terminal stroke
  • Death of a friend
  • Murder by stabbing
  • Stalking
  • Car accident

Harlem Shuffle by Colson Whitehead

To his customers and neighbors on 125th street, Carney is an upstanding salesman of reasonably priced furniture, making a decent life for himself and his family. He and his wife Elizabeth are expecting their second child, and if her parents on Striver’s Row don’t approve of him or their cramped apartment across from the subway tracks, it’s still home. Few people know he descends from a line of uptown hoods and crooks, and that his façade of normalcy has more than a few cracks in it. Cracks that are getting bigger all the time. Cash is tight, especially with all those installment… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Racism
  • Police shooting

Harriet Tubman: Live in Concert by Bob the Drag Queen

In an age of miracles where our greatest heroes from history have magically, unexplainably returned to shake us out of our confusion and hate, Harriet Tubman is back, and she has a lot to say. Harriet Tubman and four of the enslaved persons she led to freedom want to tell their story in a unique way. Harriet wants to create a hip-hop album and live show about her life, and she needs a songwriter to help her. She calls upon Darnell, a once successful hip-hop producer who was topping the charts before being outed on a BET talk show. Darnell has no idea what to expect when he steps… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Racism & slavery discussed
  • Outing & homophobia recounted
  • Smoking
  • Death of a friend from cancer mentioned
  • Kidnapping of a child
  • American Civil War mentioned

Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zeng by Kylie Lee Baker

Cora Zeng is a crime scene cleaner, washing away the remains of brutal murders and suicides in Chinatown. The bloody messes don’t bother her, not when she’s already witnessed the most horrific thing possible: her sister being pushed in front of a train. Before fleeing the scene, the murderer whispered two words: bat eater. Months pass, the killer is never caught, and Cora can barely keep herself together. She pushes away all feelings, disregards the bite marks that appear on her coffee table, and won’t take her aunt’s advice to prepare for the Hungry Ghost Festival… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger and Content Warnings

  • Graphic racist & anti-Asian hate crimes
  • Parental abandonment & nglect
  • Health anxiety & intrusive thoughts
  • Alcohol consumption
  • Blood & gore dpeiction and body horror
  • COVID-19 pandemic
  • Murder
  • Police brutality mentioned
  • Gun violence
  • Car accient
  • Fire
  • Animal cruelty & dead bodies