The Dead House

Today's post is on The Dead House by Dawn Kurtagich. It is 400 pages long and is published by Little, Brown, and Company. The cover is amber with a girl with half her face in dark and an old. Broken house under it. The intended reader is someone who likes horror and young adult literature. There in mild foul language, implied sex, and violence in this book. The story is told from different characters both in third and first person perspectives. There Be Spoilers Ahead.

From the dust jacket- Three students: dead.

Carly Johnson: vanished without a trace.

Two decades have passed since an inferno swept through Elmbridge High, claiming the lives of three teenagers and causing one student, Carly Johnson, to disappear. The main suspect: Kaitlyn, "the girl of nowhere."

Kaitlyn's diary, discovered in the ruins of Elmbridge High, reveals the thoughts of a disturbed mind. Its charred pages tell a sinister version of events that took place that tragic night, and the girl of nowhere is caught in the center of it all. But many claim Kaitlyn doesn't exist, and in a way, she doesn't - because she is the alter ego of Carly Johnson.

Carly gets the day. Kaitlyn has the night. It's during the night that a mystery surrounding the Dead House unravels and a dark, twisted magic ruins the lives of each student that dares touch it.

Debut author Dawn Kurtagich masterfully weaves together a thrilling and terrifying story using psychiatric reports, witness testimonials, video footage, and the discovered diary - and as the mystery grows, the horrifying truth about what happened that night unfolds.

Review- This is an engaging horror story from Kurtagich and in this story she tackles some interesting topics.  The main bulk of the story is two sisters who share one body. Carly is the day sister and Kaitlin is the night sister.  It has been this way for as long as they can both remember and until their parents died was never a real problem. But after their parents died people began to think that Carly was suffering from dissociative identity disorder and refused to believe either her or Kaitlin when they said they have always existed. This follows the months and days up to the disappearance of both girls and the murders of the people around them. You have a lot going on in this novel. You have discussion of mental illness, pre-christian religions and those who follow them, and good old demonic possession. You can tell that this is Kurtagich’s  first novel but she handles it with great care and she does extremely well. If you have read any of her other works I do recommend going back and reading her earlier stuff, it is just as good as stuff that she will produce  later. 

I give this book a Four out of Five stars. I get nothing for my review and I bought this with my own money.