The Sun and the Void by Gabriela Romero Lacruz

⭐️🏳️‍🌈🧠

TW: alcohol, assault, blood, child death, childbirth, death, demons, emotional abuse, gore, infertility, kidnapping, pregnancy, racism, religion, slavery, violence

I really, really wanted to love this sapphic fantasy and it has incredible world-building and a fascinating magic system. However, I found it confusing to follow and difficult to connect with the characters.

SH!T Bag by Xena Knox

🧠💙

TW: medical trauma, collapsing, blood, surgeries and aftereffects

This was was a hilarious, hopeful but also brutally honest look at living with an ileostomy bag. It is an excellent YA contemporary story, with a strong coming of age narrative intertwined with refreshingly nuanced disability representation. 

Full review here.

Threads That Bind by Kika Hatzopoulou

⭐️🏳️‍🌈🧠

TW: animal death, xenophobia, genocide, violence, murder, body horror, death, blood, confinement, transphobia, loss of a parent, toxic relationships, gaslighting

I absolutely adored this noir YA thriller infused with politics, familial relationships and Greek mythology. This is a blend between fantasy and mystery that is absolutely intoxicating,

Full review here.

The Sunbearer Trials by Aiden Thomas

⭐️🏳️‍🌈🧠💙

TW: violence, burning, dysphoria, discrimination, bullying, emotional and physical abuse;  ritual sacrifice, animal cruelty, child abuse

This was everything my Percy Jackson loving heart desired. It was so diverse, queer and full of intrigue. The marketing pitch of Percy Jackson meets the Hunger Games is spot on and I’m so excited for where Thomas takes this next.

Bellies by Nicole Dinan

⭐️🏳️‍🌈🧠

TW: transphobia, racism, homphobia, death, disordered eating

I loved this quieter, introspective literary novel that wholly thrived on the complexity and human fallibility of its two protagonists. This is the devastation of the breaking and mending of relationships.

Full review here.

The Housekeepers by Alex Hay

TW: death, sexual abuse, rape, sexual harassment, child abuse

This was just a scandalous and shocking thrill ride. It is a heist novel, rife with secrets and social commentary, but it is also an exploration of family, power and abuse of that status.

Full review here.

Some Shall Break by Ellie Marney

🧠

TW: murder, death, gore, violence, rape, sexual assault, sexual harassment, drugging, sexism, racism, trauma

I absolutely loved None Shall Sleep by Ellie Marney, thinking it was a gem in the YA thriller world. This is a loaded gun of a book, with immaculate pacing.Every page was soaked in blood and the type of tension that feels like a weight pressing down on your chest.

Full review here.

Ink Blood Sister Scribe by Emma Törzs

🏳️‍🌈 (side)🧠

There was a lot to love about this book, from the interesting magic system to the fascinating and multi-layered exploration of magical colonialism and capitalism – who gets to collect the books and how. However, I did not connect with the characters as much as I wanted to.

Ride or Die by Gail-Agnes Musikavanhu

⭐️🏳️‍🌈🧠

TW: toxic relationships, guns

This was a fun mesh of contemporary coming of age narratives, romance and thrillers. I just adored the premise of this book with the mystery and the escalating tensions, which Musikavanhu plays with expertly. It felt like taking those iconic cult films of the nineties and blending them together, with a pinch of something entirely current and new. 

Full review here.

Those We Drown by Amy Goldsmith

⭐️🧠

TW: sickness/quarantine, body horror, drug use, parental neglect, stabbing
This was a brilliant, atmospheric thriller with some intriguing and unexpected elements. I was fully on board from the very first page, with Goldsmith having me on her hook the entire time.

Full review here.

Black Heat by Bex Hogan

🏳️‍🌈🧠

TW: death, murder, sexual harassment, sexism, violence, gore, warfare

Bex Hogan just cemented why she is such a force within YA fantasy for me. Taut, thrilling and trepidatious. This fantasy standalone is dark, brooding and bloody.

Full review here.

Girl, Goddess, Queen by Bea Fitzgerald

🏳️‍🌈🧠

TW: manipulation, emotional abuse, sexual assault, rape, gaslighting, death, war, famine

This was such a fierce, funny and fresh Hades and Persephone retelling. I absolutely loved the casual bi representation, the sparky dialogue and those heated moments with the tension off the charts.

Full review here.

House of Roots and Ruin by Erin A. Craig

🧠💙

TW: ableism, death, violence, gore, murder, death of a child, forced drugging, blood

This was an atmospheric and incredibly Gothic tale that I enjoyed. I wasn’t aware going in that this was part of a series, but this worked as a standalone! However, it just fell a little short of my expectations.

The Legacies by Jessica Goodman

⭐️🏳️‍🌈🧠

TW: parent loss, drug abuse, alcohol abuse, death, murder, violence, loss, gore, grief, blackmailing, sexism, cheating

Goodman just hits the spot for me with her mysteries – they’re slick, salacious beasts that I just race through. Yet again, the intrigue and pacing were perfect and the characters were deliciously flawed.

Full review here.

Murder on a School Night by Kate Weston

⭐️🏳️‍🌈🧠

TW: death, violence, murder, blood, gore, sexism, misogyny

This was an brilliant mesh of feminism, hilarious writing and a cracking mystery to boot. The twists were excellent, the plotting was spot-on and the characterisation shone through.

Full review here.

Silver Nitrate by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

⭐️🏳️‍🌈🧠💙

TW: death, blood, body horror, xenophobia, Antisemitism, grief, car accident, murder, blood sacrifice, Nazism

Yet again, Moreno-Garcia weaves a stunning and spine-tingling web of magic, mysticism and mayhem. This is a dark and fairly bloody book that I absolutely devoured.