James Ashwood, Dark Romance Author

When I began writing in this book world, I made the (questionable?) decision not to include specific content/trigger warnings specific to each of my books, but to include a page at the beginning that covers “blanket” content warnings you may or may not run across in that particular novel.

As a dark paranormal romance reader, one grumble I sometimes have when reading in this genre is when an author lists exact content warning with such finite detail that you can see significant portions of plot from a mile away before you even read the first page. I’ve seen some writers alert readers on the introduction to specific instances they can expect and exact pages in the material that they’ll want to skip.

This is by no means to call authors out who make that decision!

Rather, I would like to use it to juxtapose my reasoning as to why I choose to only include a general list in my work, the content of which can admittedly get kinda heavy. I fully understand and appreciate that some people do need to have a safety net in the back of their minds as they read in order to ascertain whether they can read that book or not, and I don’t fault readers for that at all.

Heck, even I’ve been stressed to the point that I needed the reassurance that a romance book wasn’t going to bite so I could make it through. Life is difficult. It happens, and it keeps on happening. Sometimes, we need to just be sure that even though bad things are real, the book we’re reading isn’t going to be one of them.

When it came to choosing how I wanted to proceed with my, well, dark content, I made the choice to generalize it to the series instead of listing individual warnings in each book. I am the type of person for whom pattern recognition is a real issue, and sometimes, reading those specific warnings has ruined my experience with a book to the point where I would give it up midway through or even a few pages in.

I can unwittingly be a nightmare to watch movies/TV with because I spend the whole time either blurting out the plot (and/or secret twist) thirty seconds into the movie, or biting my tongue the whole time so I don’t give it away.

In fact, in my household, we have “Movies it’s okay to talk through,” and “Movies you need to just watch. Quietly, without interruptions.”

I’ve worked with authors and writers for many years now, and I have subsequently consumed a lot of books and other story-driven media, so it’s rare that anyone will get the drop on me when it comes to plot. For that reason, I prefer to leave my content warnings more general to subject, since I worry that other people might struggle with the same issue as to working out the story once they know specific points that will happen.

I’m curious: Do you all struggle with the same issue? Do you prefer detailed or general content warnings when reading dark paranormal romance? Let me know in the comments!

I pretty much do plan to have some ah… NSFW stuff happening at all times in the books, (even when it’s not some smoochin’). Rest assured, your Happily Ever is definitely gonna be there waiting for you in the end!

If you ever have specific concerns as my books release, however, please feel free to reach out here in the comments or contact me at JamesAshwoodAuthor@gmail.com.

Yours in secrets and shadows,
J.A.