Triggers warnings only came about in the late 1990s on feminist message boards to warn of assault and abuse stories. They became dominant on TikTok twenty-five plus years later in the 2020s, when non-writers felt they could rip apart authors and start dictating to them, especially indie authors, to add them to their books. Sadly, TikTok, and the BookTok space, has become toxic, just like book bloggers before them, full of people who don’t write, but think so highly of themselves they believe they can do better than the author they’re tearing apart.

I have personally never seen a trigger warning in a traditionally published book, and I certainly don’t put them in mine.

I am not responsible for other people’s emotional issues, they are. They have no right to dictate to those of us able to add or delete items from our books.

I hate death in books, especially the death of babies and children. But I am an adult. I can cry, and deal with it. I also fully comprehend that if there was a trigger warning about that on the back cover, or inside a book, that I’d put it down and not read it, and that means I could miss out on a perfectly good book. It’s a choice.

It’s up to you as an adult, whether or not you want to put a trigger warning in your book. Old-school older generations won’t because we don’t fall for gaslighting temper tantrums from infantile brats who belong to the generations below Gen X.

Grow up and deal with your issues with the help of your psychiatrist or counsellor. We are not your issue. Our books are not your issue.

As an indie author, it’s up to you what you do. Just as you can do all sorts to your interiors, you can add a trigger warning or not.

Don’t be bullied into it. And if someone complains that you don’t have one, tell them it’s not their business what you do in your book and you’re not doing it. Don’t fall for it.

Trigger warnings are a choice, not a requirement.