The YA's Nightstand: Dawn Kurtagich

This weeks Dear Unpublished Me is the last letter of the feature and comes from the Queen of YA horror Dawn Kurtagich!
Dawn is a writer of creepy, spooky and psychologically sinister YA fiction, where girls may descend into madness, boys may see monsters in men, and grown-ups may have something to hide. Her debut YA novel, THE DEAD HOUSE, was called "... a haunting new thriller..." by Entertainment Weekly.

WARNING - this letter made me cry (no shame) so fair warning, have your tissues at the ready!

Dear Dawn of 2012,

Everything is going to be okay. I know that you’ve lost a lot. I know that you’re suffering, but trust me when I tell you there is always a silver lining, and yes, the night is always darkest before the dawn.

Right now, you’re lying in bed, wondering what it has all been for. The years of writing, learning, crafting, trying, failing, almost succeeding and failing again. The tears, the sleepless nights, the endless notebooks and inky fingers. That stack of rejection letters so high you never quite give anyone an honest answer about just how many you got. You cry every time a published author tells their story about how they got over a hundred rejection letters because the number seems so… small.

You had an agent—a junior agent with no experience—but still! You had one. Nabbed what everyone said might be impossible. You even had an R&R from an editor at Random House—wasn’t that the best day? You worked hard on that R&R, and on the next one… and you were brave enough to know that it wasn’t a good fit and stepped back. Right now, that seems like the biggest mistake you ever made. Your only chance, gone. Your agent has left the industry. Your books are trunked. Your mother is sick. You are sick. Your husband is grieving and you’re still here.

You’ve been broken in every way a person can be broken.

You’re going to die. You know it. Everyone around you is smiling, loving you, telling you that you’re going to be okay, but you’re in an oddly peaceful mindset when it comes to your own demise. Maybe it’ll be okay. Maybe your dream just… wasn’t meant to be.

You’re wrong.

You have something to say.

There will be hard days. Days that make you question everything—your morality, your faith (this one will be tough), your loved-ones. Your sanity. You’ll have days when staying alive is the real challenge. Because dying is easy. Other days, staying sane will be the only thing to cling to. Because sanity isn’t permanent.

You’ll hurt.

You’ll cry.

Then… you’ll feel nothing. And you’ll know it’s close.

You’ll spend your fourth wedding anniversary walking through a beautiful garden on the arm of the man you love most dearly, thinking it may be the last. And you’ll think: this is okay. This is my story. It’s enough.

You’ll get the call that will save your life the very next day.

And… you’ll return. You will heal. You will live. You will write. Your stubborn I-will-be-published-if-I-have-to-write-100-books-to-get-there mindset will return. You’ll remember your burning fire. You’ll feel the stories rushing back in because, after all, you were sick and now you’re not. You’ll hesitate for only a moment… but then you’ll write the story that needs to be told. Your magnum opus… your horror. You’ll write it, hone it, take your time.

And you’ll send it out into the world. You’ll get 10 offers of representation from agents who love your book and want to make it real.

You’ll go on submission and have a pre-empt after only 25 hours.

Your book will be the Buzz Book of the Bologna Book Fair. Twice.

You’ll see it published across the Atlantic. A book. A real book. Telling the story you were brave enough to tell.

And there will be more.

So may more.

Hang in there. You’re a warrior.

Unlike previous features this week we're not doing a highlight of one of Dawns past books. No, this week I have something very special to share instead! I don't know about you but I'm a HUGE fan of Dawns books, The Dead House is one of my all time favourites (even if it did make me sleep with the light on for weeks) and I know, like myself, a lot of you lovely lot have been waiting patiently for her next book.

Which I can now reveal is hitting shelves next year and the official title of Dawn Kurtagich's next book is...

Coming 2018!

Keep up to date with all the info by following Dawn on social media

P.S. How freaking awesome is that title? Doesn't it just screams "I'm going to give you nightmares"??

If you haven't read any of Dawns books yet here are some links on where to get your hands on them.

THE DEAD HOUSE

THE CREEPER MAN/AND THE TREES CREPT IN

Click on the UK or US cover to take you to Amazon and the title for Book Depository if you're not in those region.

THE CREEPER MAN

by Dawn Kurtagich

Pages: 371 paperback

Publisher: Orion Children's Books

Publication Date: 14th July 2016

ISBN: 1510101683

Summary

When Silla and her little sister, Nori, escape London and their abusive father, Aunt Cath's country house feels like a safe haven. Leaving the smog and fear behind, the girls have the love and freedom they never had in their violent home. But slowly, ever so slowly, things begin to unravel.
Aunt Cath locks herself in the attic and spends day and night pacing; every day the surrounding forest inches slowly towards the house; a mysterious boy appears from the enclosing wood offering friendship, and Nori claims that a man watches them from the dark forest. A man with no eyes who creeps ever closer.

Review

Dawn Kurtagich is one of my favourite authors at the moment and her debut novel The Dead House still gives me the chills today. So when it came to reading her second book The Creeper Man I had high expectations. I was not disappointed although it was not what I was expecting. However, as always Dawn managed to creep me the fudge out!

Me while reading The Creeper Man... TOTALLY spooked!

The Creeper Man is the haunting story of Silla Daniels as she takes her little sister Nori to a new life at La Baume. La Baume is the manor in which their Aunt Cathy lives, but when they arrive it isn't the fresh new start they were hoping for. The house holds too many secrets and as the woods begin to move closer, trapping them in the house that has driven their Aunt mad, Silla and Nori are left to confront The Creeper Man. A fairy tale gone wrong, the boogie man in the woods, The Creeper Man has no eyes and tall thin limbs like menacing tree roots. He comes when he's called and in 1980 Cath and her two sisters summoned him to La Baume... he never left.

There were moments of pure horrifying genius in this book that will make me fear walking into the woods the rest of my life! The story itself in woven with an unusual writing style that is almost like being inside Silla's deteriorating brain. The text repeats itself, it gets bigger and smaller when appropriate and paints a disturbing picture of what it is like to be haunted by The Creeper Man.

Silla herself is a fascinating character, she is the quintessential YA protagonist in many ways, 17, strong, stubborn and has the weight of the world on her shoulders. However, at the same time she is falling apart, she is scared. Silla wants to keep her family safe but you get the feeling she doesn't know how and from start to finish she is in survival mode. My heart broke for Silla so many times and the disturbing things she had to go through to get to the end of the book gave me shivers.

This is one of those books that twists and turns until it morphs into something you weren't expecting. I don't want too say much as I don't want to give anything away but the ending blew my mind and made me realise I wasn't reading the story I thought I was.

Although just because I can't tell you what happens doesn't mean I cant' show you in gifs....