Tag Archives: Torture

The All-Consuming World by Cassandra Khaw

The All-Consuming World by Cassandra Khaw

A diverse team of broken, diminished former criminals get back together to solve the mystery of their last, disastrous mission and to rescue a missing and much-changed comrade… but they’re not the only ones in pursuit of the secret at the heart of the planet Dimmuborgir. The highly-evolved AI of the universe have their own agenda and will do whatever it takes to keep humans from ever controlling the universe again. This band of dangerous women, half-clone and half-machine, must battle their own traumas and a universe of sapient ageships who want them dead, in order to settle their affairs once and for all.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Suicide
  • Self-harm
  • Eye trauma
  • Surgical procedures
  • Amputation
  • Torture
  • Blackmail

The Hellion and the Hero by Emily Sullivan

The Hellion and the Hero by Emily Sullivan

Lady Georgiana Arlington has always done what’s best for her family—even when it meant marrying a man she didn’t love to save her father. Her husband’s death has left her stronger and bolder—a hellion, some would even say. When a mysterious enemy jeopardizes her livelihood and reputation, there’s only one person she can trust to help her uncover the threat: the same man she left heartbroken years ago. Captain Henry Harris is no longer the penniless fortune hunter he was when they first met. Now a decorated naval hero, he could have his choice of women, but no other… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
  • Infertility
  • Death of a husband
  • Torture recounted
  • Kidnapping
  • Military service

A Winter’s Promise by Christelle Dabos

A Winter’s Promise by Christelle Dabos

Long ago, following a cataclysm called “The Rupture,” the world was shattered into many floating celestial islands. Known now as Arks, each has developed in distinct ways; each seems to possess its own unique relationship to time, such that nowadays vastly different worlds exist, together but apart. And over all of the Arks the spirit of an omnipotent ancestor abides. Ophelia lives on Anima, an ark where objects have souls. Beneath her worn scarf and thick glasses, the young girl hides the ability to read and communicate with the souls of objects, and the power to travel… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Misogyny
  • Fatmisia
  • Forced arranged marriage
  • Murder
  • Torture
  • Physical assault

The Strange Thing We Become and Other Dark Tales by Eric LaRocca

The Strange Thing We Become and Other Dark Tales by Eric LaRocca

Eight stories of literary dark fiction from a master storyteller. Exploring the shadow side of love, these are tales of grief, obsession, control. Intricate examinations of trauma and tragedy in raw, poetic prose. In these narratives, a woman imagines horrific scenarios whilst caring for her infant niece; on-line posts chronicle a cancer diagnosis; a couple in the park with their small child encounter a stranger with horrific consequences; a toxic relationship reaches a terrifying resolution…

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Abusive relationship
  • Elder abuse
  • Incest
  • Cheating
  • Miscarriage
  • Cancer & terminal illness
  • Death of a parent
  • Death of a spouse
  • Murder
  • Kidnapping
  • Torture

Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko

Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko

Tayo, a young Native American, has been a prisoner of the Japanese during World War II, and the horrors of captivity have almost eroded his will to survive. His return to the Laguna Pueblo reservation only increases his feeling of estrangement and alienation. While other returning soldiers find easy refuge in alcohol and senseless violence, Tayo searches for another kind of comfort and resolution. Tayo’s quest leads him back to the Indian past and its traditions, to beliefs about witchcraft and evil, and to the ancient stories of his people. The search itself becomes a… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Racism
  • Sexual assault
  • Child abandonment
  • PTSD & trauma
  • Alcoholism
  • Torture
  • War & colonisation themes

Knight Awakening by Rebecca Zanetti

Knight Awakening by Rebecca Zanetti

The world has changed. Any rules that might’ve been in place before the Scorpius bacterium ripped through civilization and decreased its population are no longer in place. Obsession and survival are the new reality. So, Marcus Knight, after a hellish time in captivity that stole most of his memory and all of his soul, has one focus, and that’s keeping Dr. Penelope Kim safe in the aftermath. She’d risked her life to save him once, and she’s all that matters. For months, he’s kept his distance, protecting her from afar, because he knows that one touch—one sigh—one kiss—from… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Attempted rape
  • Memory loss
  • Pregnancy complications
  • Medical experimentation
  • Torture mentioned

Perhaps the Stars by Ada Palmer

Perhaps the Stars by Ada Palmer

World Peace turns into global civil war. In the future, the leaders of Hive nations—nations without fixed location—clandestinely committed nefarious deeds in order to maintain an outward semblance of utopian stability. But the facade could only last so long. The comforts of effortless global travel and worldwide abundance may have tempered humanity’s darkest inclinations, but conflict remains deeply rooted in the human psyche. All it needed was a catalyst, in form of special little boy to ignite half a millennium of repressed… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Rape
  • Cheating
  • Suicide
  • Mutilation
  • Medical experimentation
  • Torture

Too Like the Lightning by Ada Palmer

Too Like the Lightning by Ada Palmer

Mycroft Canner is a convict. For his crimes he is required, as is the custom of the 25th century, to wander the world being as useful as he can to all he meets. Carlyle Foster is a sensayer, a spiritual counsellor, in a world that has outlawed the public practice of religion, but which also knows that the inner lives of humans cannot be wished away. The world into which Mycroft and Carlyle have been born is as strange to our 21st-century eyes as ours would be to a native of the 1500s. It is a hard-won utopia built on technologically-generated abundance… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Slavery
  • Rape
  • Incest
  • Suicide
  • Murder
  • Torture

These Twisted Bonds by Lexi Ryan

These Twisted Bonds by Lexi Ryan

After Abriella’s sister was sold to the fae, she thought life couldn’t get any worse. But when she suddenly finds herself caught in a web of lies of her own making ­- loving two princes and trusting neither – things are not quite as clear as she once thought. As civil war wages in the Court of Darkness, Brie finds herself unable to choose a side. How can she know where she stands when she doesn’t even know herself anymore? In this darkly romantic thrill ride, the more Faerie is torn apart from the inside, the clearer it becomes that prophecies don’t lie and Brie has a role to play in the… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Death of a parent
  • Torture
  • Kidnapping

Wretched by Emily McIntire

Wretched by Emily McIntire

Evelina Westerly has always been the bad guy. As the brains, brawn, and botanist behind her family’s drug empire, she’s her father’s ruthless secret weapon. With her days divided between perfecting her greenhouse, seeking revenge for her sister’s murder, and putting a gun to the head of anyone in her way, Evelina doesn’t have time for anything else. Especially not for love. After a one-night stand with a gorgeous man at a nightclub, she’s sated her urges and is back to her criminal ways. That is, until that same man shows up as the new Westerly lackey under a totally… Read more.

Goodreads • The Story Graph

Trigger & Content Warnings

  • Emotional child & sibling abuse recounted
  • Panic attack recounted
  • Drug use
  • Overdose mentioned
  • Grief & loss depiction
  • Death of a sibling recounted
  • Death of a parent recounted
  • Murder
  • Graphic torture
  • Gun violence
  • Physical assault