Tag Archives: Racism

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

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

The Mirror Season by Anna-Marie McLemore

The Mirror Season by Anna-Marie McLemore

Graciela Cristales’s whole world changes after she and a boy she barely knows are assaulted at the same party. She loses her gift for making enchanted pan dulce. Neighbourhood trees vanish overnight, while mirrored glass appears, bringing reckless magic with it. And Ciela is haunted by what happened to her, and what happened to the boy whose name she never learned. But when the boy, Lock, shows up at Ciela’s school, he has no memory of that night, and no clue that a single piece of mirrored glass is taking his life apart. Ciela decides to help him, which means hiding... Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Fatmisia & body shaming
  • Homomisia
  • Bimisia
  • Racism
  • Sexism
  • Classism
  • Victim blaming
  • Rape
  • Sexual assault
  • Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
  • Drugging
  • Blood depiction
  • Emesis
  • Death of a grandparent recounted
  • Bullying

Nightingale Point by Luan Goldie

Nightingale Point by Luan Goldie

One ordinary day. One extraordinary event. Their lives changed forever. On an ordinary Saturday morning in 1996, the residents of Nightingale Point wake up to their normal lives and worries. Mary has a secret life that no one knows about, not even Malachi and Tristan, the brothers she vowed to look after. Malachi had to grow up too quickly. Between looking after Tristan and nursing a broken heart, he feels older than his twenty-one years. Tristan wishes Malachi would stop pining for Pamela. No wonder he’s falling in with the wrong crowd, without Malachi to keep him straight. Elvis… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Ableism
  • Racism
  • Sexism
  • Abandonment
  • Cheating
  • Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
  • Drug abuse
  • Bullying

Dear Martin by Nic Stone

Dear Martin by Nic Stone

Justyce McAllister is top of his class and set for the Ivy League—but none of that matters to the police officer who just put him in handcuffs. And despite leaving his rough neighbourhood behind, he can’t escape the scorn of his former peers or the ridicule of his new classmates. Justyce looks to the teachings of Dr Martin Luther King Jr. for answers. But do they hold up anymore? He starts a journal to Dr King to find out. Then comes the day Justuce goes driving with his best friend, Manny, windows rolled down, music turned up-way up, sparking the fury of a white off… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Racism (theme)
  • Domestic violence
  • Police brutality & racial profiling
  • Murder
  • Gun violence
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a friend
  • Incarceration mentioned

From Scratch by Katrina Jackson

From Scratch by Katrina Jackson

Sea Port is a tiny southern town on the verge of collapse looking to entice people to move to the middle of nowhere and start life anew. Mary Woods, stinging from her life as a failed academic, takes the opportunity by the reins and resettles in Sea Port to try her hand as a small-town baker. A few days before the opening of her shop, Confections by Mary, she runs into small-town cop, Miguel Santos, and small-town fire chief, Billy Knox and there’s a whole lot of chemistry to go around. Welcome to Sea Port, where the town baker, cop and fire chief fall heavily in lust.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Racism
  • Queermisia
  • Child sexual abuse recounted
  • Physical child abuse mentioned
  • Domestic abuse mentioned
  • Parent with alcoholism & alcohol abuse mentioned
  • Physical assault mentioned

The Storm Crow by Kalyn Josephson

The Storm Crow by Kalyn Josephson

Princess Thia was born to be a crow rider—a warrior. In her kingdom of Rhodaire, magical elemental crows keep the city running. But when the Illucian empire invades, they kill all the crows in a horrible fire that also robs Thia of her mother and mentor. Then Thia’s sister, Caliza, becomes the new queen of Rhodaire, she is forced to agree to a marriage between Thia and the Illucian heir in an effort to save her people. Prince Ericen is rude and cruel and Thia can’t imagine travelling into the heart of an enemy city after so much has been taken from her. But before she… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Ableism & internalised ableism
  • Racism
  • Forced arranged marriage
  • Cheating mentioned
  • Depression (theme)
  • Nightmares
  • Suicidal ideation
  • Self-harm & self-injury
  • Serious injury of a loved one
  • Dead bodies
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a mother on-page
  • Death of an aunt, off-page
  • Murder & attempted murder
  • Physical assault
  • Torture
  • Fire
  • Graphic animal death, on-page
  • War themes, including invasion & colonialism

The World We Make by NK Jemisin

The World We Make by N.K. Jemisin

All is not well in the city that never sleeps. Even though the avatars of New York City have temporarily managed to stop the Woman in White from invading—and destroying the entire universe in the process—the mysterious capital “E” Enemy has more subtle powers at her disposal. A new candidate for mayor wielding the populist rhetoric of gentrification, xenophobia, and “law and order” may have what it takes to change the very nature of New York itself and take it down from the inside. In order to defeat him, and the Enemy who holds his purse strings, the avatars will have to join together with the other Great Cities of the world in… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Racism
  • Deportation
  • Police brutality

The Davenports by Krystal Marquis

The Davenports by Krystal Marquis

In 1910, the Davenports are one of the few Black families of immense wealth and status in a changing United States, their fortune made through the entrepreneurship of William Davenport, a formerly enslaved man who founded the Davenport Carriage Company years ago. Now the Davenports live surrounded by servants, crystal chandeliers, and endless parties, finding their way and finding love—even where they’re not supposed to. There is Olivia, the beautiful elder Davenport daughter, ready to do her duty by getting married until she meets… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Racism
  • Colourism

Gutter Child by Jael Richardson

Gutter Child by Jael Richardson

Set in an imagined world in which the most vulnerable are forced to buy their freedom by working off their debt to society, Gutter Child uncovers a nation divided into the privileged Mainland and the policed Gutter. In this world, Elimina Dubois is one of only 100 babies taken from the Gutter and raised in the land of opportunity as part of a social experiment led by the Mainland government. But when her Mainland mother dies, Elimina finds herself all alone, a teenager forced into an unfamiliar life of servitude… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Racism
  • Indentured servitude
  • Rape
  • Forced sex work
  • Child abuse
  • Suicide
  • Teen pregnancy
  • Miscarriage
  • Murder of an infant
  • Police brutality

We Are Not Like Them by Christine Pride and Jo Piazza

We Are Not Like Them by Christine Pride and Jo Piazza

Jen and Riley have been best friends since kindergarten. As adults, they remain as close as sisters, though their lives have taken different directions. Jen married young, and after years of trying, is finally pregnant. Riley pursued her childhood dream of becoming a television journalist and is poised to become one of the first Black female anchors of the top news channel in their hometown of Philadelphia. But the deep bond they share is severely tested when Jen’s husband, a city police officer, is involved in the shooting of an unarmed Black teenager. Six month… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Racism & racial slurs
  • Pregnancy & childbirth
  • Infertility & IVF treatment
  • Miscarriage
  • Police brutality including the shooting of an unarmed Black teenager

For Lamb by Lesa Cline-Ransome

For Lamb by Lesa Cline-Ransome

For Lamb follows a family striving to better their lives in the late 1930s Jackson, Mississippi. Lamb’s mother is a hard-working, creative seamstress who cannot reveal she is a lesbian. Lamb’s brother has a brilliant mind and has even earned a college scholarship for a black college up north– if only he could curb his impulsiveness and rebellious nature. Lamb herself is a quiet and studious girl. She is also naive. As she tentatively accepts the friendly overtures of a white girl who loans her a book she loves, she sets off a calamitous series of events that pulls in … Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Racism
  • Lynching