Whump Of All Time Tournament #2: Electric Book-aloo

🔪💉🔪💉🔪We're Back!🔪💉🔪💉🔪

WHAT:

A polls tournament to find the greatest whump book of all time (WBOAT). Are we judging by best writing? Juiciest tropes? Most whumpable characters? Variety? Density? You decide!

WHEN:

Open for nominations NOW! Nominations will run through November 1st, 2025. Polls will be posted after that, and the tournament will (hopefully, depending on the number of entries) be finished by December 1st.

Want to help out? Reblog this post, or tag your most passionate book-whump mutual. The more nominations we get, the better the tournament!

Please note that spoilers will abound!

🔪💉🔪💉🔪SUBMIT HERE!!🔪💉🔪💉

NOMINATION GUIDELINES:

1. Whump is defined as broadly as possible, including sickfick and angst, although the focus is the classic "hurt/comfort, heavy on the hurt".

 2. "Whump books" are written, original works featuring whump. They need to be accessible to voters, so please nothing behind paywalls or from very small presses that don't ship internationally (for instance). No fanfiction or books that can't stand alone, for similar reasons. Novel-length original works available on Tumblr or elsewhere on the internet are ok to submit, as are self-published original works.

3. There are no restrictions surrounding age or identity of characters, sexual violence, vanilla NSFW content, or anything else. Submit it all! We'll do our best to include warnings for submissions with minor characters or sexual violence, but can't guarantee this.

4. Submissions for the works on an entire author, a specific character, etc, will be deleted.

5. Please consider submitting propaganda can be submitted with your nominations. Excerpts are encouraged! You can also tag this blog or send an ask (ie, if you've written a post about a book before).

6. There are no restrictions on submitting your own work.

7. Please avoid tagging authors on Tumblr about any submissions of their work. They can interact with us as they choose, if they choose. Don't make their Tumblr experience weird. (Exceptions: close personal friends and mutuals; defer to your dynamics, of course.)

The Sparrow:

Anon says, "The main character has been through an incredibly traumatizing ordeal that has left him mentally scarred, physically disfigured, and in poor health. He is interrogated throughout the book about the events leading up to this ordeal by superiors who don't know what happened and have little sympathy for him.

The book constantly switches between present and past, so you get contrasting views of this character when he used to be a bright and outgoing man versus when he is a traumatized wreck who won't stand up for himself.

On top of the whump, this is a beautiful piece of literature, highly recommend!"

Murderbot:

Les Miserables:

@melannen says, "Look it's literally titled "The Wretched". Jean Valjean suffers when his parents die and then suffers from poverty and having to take care of his sister's family and when they starve he suffers really hard in prison for 20 years! and then he finally gets out and everybody hates him and spits on him and he suffers some more! and then he meets the Bishop, who is so nice to him he has a complete mental break and has to try to completely erase and deny his past even when that means cutting himself off from everyone, even himself, and he's being stalked by an equally wretched cop who has never experience happiness and wants to throw him back in prison.

And then we meed Fantine…. (and then Cosette. Eponine. Marius. Mabeuf. …..) And then everybody dies, except Marius and Cosette who are trapped in a haunted house with his abusive grandfather forever."

Assassin's Apprentice:

Anon: "This book is so emotional and the main character, Fitz, is put through so many awful situations. Not only being injured, poisoned etc but also mentally through being chronically gaslit by a superior. The kind of emotional anguish suffered by Fitz is very heavy and it is astonishing to imagine it happening to someone as young as he was in this book. It makes you want to just wrap him up and prevent anything else from hurting him <3 NOT a feel-good book."

Post from 2021 by @whvmp (about the whole book): "You guys this is some god tier whump. It's got more whump than your average 8 season tv show, and it is good. Im talking poison, im talking seizures, im talking mind control and energy leeching and chronic disorders and ptsd and torture and and and...

If youre looking for a good political assassin fantasy story you have to pick this one up, it does not disappoint."

Assassin's Apprentice:

Anon: "This book is so emotional and the main character, Fitz, is put through so many awful situations. Not only being injured, poisoned etc but also mentally through being chronically gaslit by a superior. The kind of emotional anguish suffered by Fitz is very heavy and it is astonishing to imagine it happening to someone as young as he was in this book. It makes you want to just wrap him up and prevent anything else from hurting him <3 NOT a feel-good book."

Post from 2021 by @whvmp (about the whole book): "You guys this is some god tier whump. It's got more whump than your average 8 season tv show, and it is good. Im talking poison, im talking seizures, im talking mind control and energy leeching and chronic disorders and ptsd and torture and and and...

If youre looking for a good political assassin fantasy story you have to pick this one up, it does not disappoint."

@janeways-coffees says, "Y'all. This shouldnt even be a competition. This is the book where fitzy gets poisoned and drowned and develops a seizure disorder because of it. It's the book where he gets mind-raped. It's the book where he sacrifices his chance at Skilling for Burrich and gets unequivocally disowned for it. Its the one where his dog dies. It the very first one and things only get worse from here!!!!"

All Systems Red:

Les Mis:

@melannen says, "Look it's literally titled "The Wretched". Jean Valjean suffers when his parents die and then suffers from poverty and having to take care of his sister's family and when they starve he suffers really hard in prison for 20 years! and then he finally gets out and everybody hates him and spits on him and he suffers some more! and then he meets the Bishop, who is so nice to him he has a complete mental break and has to try to completely erase and deny his past even when that means cutting himself off from everyone, even himself, and he's being stalked by an equally wretched cop who has never experience happiness and wants to throw him back in prison.

And then we meed Fantine…. (and then Cosette. Eponine. Marius. Mabeuf. …..) And then everybody dies, except Marius and Cosette who are trapped in a haunted house with his abusive grandfather forever."

The Sparrow:

Anon says, "The main character has been through an incredibly traumatizing ordeal that has left him mentally scarred, physically disfigured, and in poor health. He is interrogated throughout the book about the events leading up to this ordeal by superiors who don't know what happened and have little sympathy for him.

The book constantly switches between present and past, so you get contrasting views of this character when he used to be a bright and outgoing man versus when he is a traumatized wreck who won't stand up for himself.

On top of the whump, this is a beautiful piece of literature, highly recommend!"

The Lies of Locke Lamora:

Micha says, "A group of orphan thieves and con artists in a fantasy setting. Trials, fights, angst, grief, faking illness by making himself sick… Hard to describe it without spoiling, but if you've read it, you know it's very whump filled. It can be read alone, but the sequels are also full of hurt!"

The Sparrow:

Anon says, "The main character has been through an incredibly traumatizing ordeal that has left him mentally scarred, physically disfigured, and in poor health. He is interrogated throughout the book about the events leading up to this ordeal by superiors who don't know what happened and have little sympathy for him.

The book constantly switches between present and past, so you get contrasting views of this character when he used to be a bright and outgoing man versus when he is a traumatized wreck who won't stand up for himself.

On top of the whump, this is a beautiful piece of literature, highly recommend!"