Review | The Dead House by Dawn Kurtagich

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.

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An epistolary novel of sorts, The Dead House opens with the reader being brought into an ongoing investigation into "The Johnson Incident", decades after it first occurred. This incident involved a fire at Elmbridge High School, the death of three students and the disappearance of another. In the rubble, Kaitlyn's diary is found, taking the reader back to the events that unfolded prior to the fire. As other evidence is found, the story is then pieced together through not only the diary entries, but also transcripts from interviews and recovered video footage. Through these mediums, we learn the story of Kaitlyn and Carly Johnson, orphaned after a car accident takes both their parents... but what really happened? While Kaitlyn and Carly insist they are in fact two different souls born into one body and have always been so, Dr. Annabeth Lansing believes the reality is Carly is suffering from DID (Dissociative Identity Disorder, aka Multiple Personality Disorder), having created Kaitlyn in the wake of the traumatic deaths of both her parents. So what's the real story? That reveals itself little by little as the story progresses. Meanwhile, the reader gets to know Kaitlyn and Carly through diary entries and Post-It Note exchanges (since they can't occupy the body at the same time, this is the only way they know to communicate with each other) until one day Carly's notes to Kaitlyn just stop and Kaitlyn has to figure out what happened.

I know the author, Dawn Kurtagich, through the Booktube community on Youtube and have followed her vlogs throughout the development of this novel -- from the writing of it through to its actual publication -- so of course I was curious to check it out once it hit the US! I was also compelled to read The Dead House after Dawn shared some of her inspirations for the story, some medical struggles she went through that echoed experiences in my own life. One bit that especially caught my attention was her revealing that part of the inspiration for Carly and Kaitlyn came from a portion of Dawn's own life, where she struggled with inversion syndrome, a condition that causes one to be awake during the night instead of the day. I had never heard the term inversion syndrome but I do have Delayed Sleep Phase Disorder (alternately known as Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome, depending on where you read about it, its acronym still being DSPS) which, in layman's terms, makes a person basically have the sleep pattern of nocturnal creatures such as bats or owls.

Man, I struggled with what to rate this one! I kept going back and forth because there were parts I really liked and then other parts that felt really muddled and I couldn't quite make out what was going on all the time. In a way, the murkiness of some of the scenes worked in the story's favor because we get into themes of depression, possible psychosis, feelings of mania... but then I was still left feeling like I'm sorry but I really wish that was explained a little bit better. But one thing I was really impressed with was just how many layers there are to the characters and the story, that you don't really consider until you put the book down for a bit and think about it. It can already be tricky to follow in parts because of two people fighting for space in one body, but then Kurtagich introduces the idea of What if one of those people in that one body additionally suffered a possible possession by an outside evil spirit? Dang, now that poor body is seeming really crowded!

Carly says anger is a weapon, but sometimes I think it's just another cage.

~Kaitlyn

As far as being a YA thriller, the creepy factor didn't really kick in for me until about 150 pages in, when Kaitlyn first starts having those freaky nightmares. While the ending chapters were fast paced and entertaining, there was something to them that was a little unsatisfying. It also frustrated me (but also kinda amused me lol) that Kaitlyn kept looking at different people saying "they're seriously f-d up and, okay, maybe seemed like they wanted me dead... but they're good people really."

The format is really fun and definitely encourages one to keep reading to find out the real story. I found Ari to be a pretty intriguing character and while I wasn't really feeling Naida at first, she grew on me. I wish there had been a little more to the story of Haji.