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Kill Your Darlings
Not yet published
Expected 22 Sep 26A fun, fast-paced YA horror about a teen girl facing the horrors of misogyny, racism, an evil witch, and her horde of monsters.
Thulasi is the perfect she’s responsible, she never breaks the rules, and she’s always willing to babysit her seven-year-old cousin. Even on Halloween night.
But the night takes a horrifying turn when a simple playdate leads to accidentally summoning a horde of monsters out of a book of horror tales, along with her small town’s most famous author, Addison Greer—Thulasi’s literary hero. Except Addison has a more sinister scheme planned for her miraculous revenge on the family that wronged her.
Drawn into a bloodthirsty bargain with Addison, Thulasi will have to team up with Sam, the super cute quarterback in her class, and the only other teen stuck with babysitting duty on Halloween. They only have until midnight to foil Addison’s plans—while keeping their seven-year-old charges safe—or her monsters will destroy their town and everyone they love.
Thulasi is the perfect she’s responsible, she never breaks the rules, and she’s always willing to babysit her seven-year-old cousin. Even on Halloween night.
But the night takes a horrifying turn when a simple playdate leads to accidentally summoning a horde of monsters out of a book of horror tales, along with her small town’s most famous author, Addison Greer—Thulasi’s literary hero. Except Addison has a more sinister scheme planned for her miraculous revenge on the family that wronged her.
Drawn into a bloodthirsty bargain with Addison, Thulasi will have to team up with Sam, the super cute quarterback in her class, and the only other teen stuck with babysitting duty on Halloween. They only have until midnight to foil Addison’s plans—while keeping their seven-year-old charges safe—or her monsters will destroy their town and everyone they love.
- GenresYoung AdultHorrorFantasy
352 pages, Paperback
Expected publication September 22, 2026
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
Review of advance copy received from Author
I LOVED this book. If you were a fan of Goosebumps or Scary Stories To Tell In The Dark, KILL YOUR DARLINGS is for you.
Evil undead writers, monsters spawning out of a book, high school drama - what more could you want?! Terror, humor, heart, this book has it all.
5/5 stars 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟
Evil undead writers, monsters spawning out of a book, high school drama - what more could you want?! Terror, humor, heart, this book has it all.
5/5 stars 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
Thank you NetGalley and Penguin Young Readers Group for the ARC in exchange for an honest review!
“Kill Your Darlings” by Yuvashri Harish is basically what would happen if your favorite creepy childhood storybook suddenly decided to take revenge on everyone, and honestly, it’s way darker than I expected in the best way.
At first, it feels like a fun YA horror setup: Halloween night, babysitting duty, monsters escaping from a beloved children’s horror book, and an undead famous author with very bad intentions. Already a win. But this book gets surprisingly heavy underneath all the monster chaos, tackling racism, misogyny, family pressure (specifically parentification), and the messy reality of idolizing people who absolutely do not deserve it. People always say you shouldn’t meet your heroes as reality may differ from perception, and that is definitely true in this book.
The main character, Thulasi, is such an easy person to root for because she’s painfully relatable. She’s a huge people pleaser where she is constantly saying yes, constantly putting everyone else first, and carrying way too much responsibility for someone her age. She deals a lot with parentification and guilt, especially when it comes to family, and watching her slowly realize she doesn’t have to destroy herself for everyone else was one of the strongest parts of the book. Even the villain herself wanted Thulasi to respect herself more.
Then there’s Addison Greer, the famous children’s author Thulasi grew up admiring and who turns out to be an absolutely fantastic villain. She’s manipulative, bitter, powerful, and kind of terrifying. I really liked how the book handled the idea of discovering that someone whose work you love is actually deeply flawed—or worse, actively harmful. Addison’s books are revealed to have racist caricatures and “othering” baked into them, which opens up that very real conversation of how we deal with beloved older stories that have harmful elements in them.
And the monsters are great. Once blood gets on Addison’s original manuscript, all the creatures from her stories come spilling into the real world, and things go from spooky to full-on nightmare fuel. Harpies, gore, violent deaths; the body count here is way higher than I expected for YA horror. At first the horror is a little glossed over, but once it gets going, it gets descriptive. Definitely more brutal than your average teen horror.
One of my favorite parts was how the characters use their knowledge of the original stories to fight back. Since they grew up reading these monsters, they actually know some of their weaknesses, which makes the survival aspect way more fun. I honestly wanted even more of that because it gave the book such a cool edge.
The two younger kids being babysat were also standouts for me. They felt realistic and added both emotional stakes and chaos, because trying to save the town is stressful enough; trying to do it while keeping traumatized seven-year-olds alive? Even worse.
There’s also a little romance between Thulasi and Sam, the cute quarterback who gets dragged into this nightmare with her. It stays pretty light and doesn’t take over the story, which works well because they’re both a little busy trying not to die. It’s sweet and mostly serves as emotional support rather than forced romance drama.
The pacing is fast, though sometimes the magical explanations provide too much of an info-dump, and I do wish we had gotten more setup for the monsters and original stories before everything exploded into chaos. It would’ve made some of the horror hit even harder.
Still, the ending is really satisfying. It wraps things up well, gives Thulasi real growth, and avoids making revenge feel glamorous. A big theme here is how vengeance and “justice” can twist people, even people with good intentions, and the book handles that surprisingly well.
Overall, “Kill Your Darlings” is creepy, bloody, smart, and way more emotionally layered than I expected. If you liked the Goosebumps books but wanted them with more gore, more emotional depth, and a deeply messy undead author causing problems, this one is absolutely worth picking up.
“Kill Your Darlings” by Yuvashri Harish is basically what would happen if your favorite creepy childhood storybook suddenly decided to take revenge on everyone, and honestly, it’s way darker than I expected in the best way.
At first, it feels like a fun YA horror setup: Halloween night, babysitting duty, monsters escaping from a beloved children’s horror book, and an undead famous author with very bad intentions. Already a win. But this book gets surprisingly heavy underneath all the monster chaos, tackling racism, misogyny, family pressure (specifically parentification), and the messy reality of idolizing people who absolutely do not deserve it. People always say you shouldn’t meet your heroes as reality may differ from perception, and that is definitely true in this book.
The main character, Thulasi, is such an easy person to root for because she’s painfully relatable. She’s a huge people pleaser where she is constantly saying yes, constantly putting everyone else first, and carrying way too much responsibility for someone her age. She deals a lot with parentification and guilt, especially when it comes to family, and watching her slowly realize she doesn’t have to destroy herself for everyone else was one of the strongest parts of the book. Even the villain herself wanted Thulasi to respect herself more.
Then there’s Addison Greer, the famous children’s author Thulasi grew up admiring and who turns out to be an absolutely fantastic villain. She’s manipulative, bitter, powerful, and kind of terrifying. I really liked how the book handled the idea of discovering that someone whose work you love is actually deeply flawed—or worse, actively harmful. Addison’s books are revealed to have racist caricatures and “othering” baked into them, which opens up that very real conversation of how we deal with beloved older stories that have harmful elements in them.
And the monsters are great. Once blood gets on Addison’s original manuscript, all the creatures from her stories come spilling into the real world, and things go from spooky to full-on nightmare fuel. Harpies, gore, violent deaths; the body count here is way higher than I expected for YA horror. At first the horror is a little glossed over, but once it gets going, it gets descriptive. Definitely more brutal than your average teen horror.
One of my favorite parts was how the characters use their knowledge of the original stories to fight back. Since they grew up reading these monsters, they actually know some of their weaknesses, which makes the survival aspect way more fun. I honestly wanted even more of that because it gave the book such a cool edge.
The two younger kids being babysat were also standouts for me. They felt realistic and added both emotional stakes and chaos, because trying to save the town is stressful enough; trying to do it while keeping traumatized seven-year-olds alive? Even worse.
There’s also a little romance between Thulasi and Sam, the cute quarterback who gets dragged into this nightmare with her. It stays pretty light and doesn’t take over the story, which works well because they’re both a little busy trying not to die. It’s sweet and mostly serves as emotional support rather than forced romance drama.
The pacing is fast, though sometimes the magical explanations provide too much of an info-dump, and I do wish we had gotten more setup for the monsters and original stories before everything exploded into chaos. It would’ve made some of the horror hit even harder.
Still, the ending is really satisfying. It wraps things up well, gives Thulasi real growth, and avoids making revenge feel glamorous. A big theme here is how vengeance and “justice” can twist people, even people with good intentions, and the book handles that surprisingly well.
Overall, “Kill Your Darlings” is creepy, bloody, smart, and way more emotionally layered than I expected. If you liked the Goosebumps books but wanted them with more gore, more emotional depth, and a deeply messy undead author causing problems, this one is absolutely worth picking up.
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
Thank you to NetGalley for the eARC in exchange for an honest review!
I really, really wanted to love this one, but unfortunately it ended up simply as good.
The premise was amazing: imagine accidentally summoning monsters out of a book that your favourite author wrote.
It was giving the vibe of old horror novels/movies that most of us probably enjoyed as teenagers and I was living for it. Sadly, it didn't really deliver for me, at least not in the way I expected.
I think, that after I first read the blurb, I was expecting something where we will be fighting with those monsters a lot more, than we did in the actual book, at least that was the impression I got, so that might be on me. The monsters did appear, but they didn't really seem to be crucial to the story itself. More like something that is going to appear, cause havoc and disappear next moment, because it's not needed anymore.
The main focus seemed to be on the deeper problems and while I didn't mind them, because they're important, I honestly didn't expect that they will became so important for the plot, to the point of almost overshadowing it. They were portrayed really good and for example, .
One of the parts that did seemed unnecessary in my eyes, was the constant reminder that they're kids/teenagers/their age. I don't think I ever read any other YA book, that decided to repeat the fact so many times.
One of the moments I liked the most was the growth of our FMC, I mean .
Overall, while it wasn't a hit for me and I simply enjoyed the read for most part, I'm sure there will be a lot people who will absolutely love it.
I really, really wanted to love this one, but unfortunately it ended up simply as good.
The premise was amazing: imagine accidentally summoning monsters out of a book that your favourite author wrote.
It was giving the vibe of old horror novels/movies that most of us probably enjoyed as teenagers and I was living for it. Sadly, it didn't really deliver for me, at least not in the way I expected.
I think, that after I first read the blurb, I was expecting something where we will be fighting with those monsters a lot more, than we did in the actual book, at least that was the impression I got, so that might be on me. The monsters did appear, but they didn't really seem to be crucial to the story itself. More like something that is going to appear, cause havoc and disappear next moment, because it's not needed anymore.
The main focus seemed to be on the deeper problems and while I didn't mind them, because they're important, I honestly didn't expect that they will became so important for the plot, to the point of almost overshadowing it. They were portrayed really good and for example, .
One of the parts that did seemed unnecessary in my eyes, was the constant reminder that they're kids/teenagers/their age. I don't think I ever read any other YA book, that decided to repeat the fact so many times.
One of the moments I liked the most was the growth of our FMC, I mean .
Overall, while it wasn't a hit for me and I simply enjoyed the read for most part, I'm sure there will be a lot people who will absolutely love it.
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
This was a YA horror read chock full of scares.
But not just that. Thulasi the MC is a high school age girl navigating life in a small town being one of the very few POC. She's Tamil and always seemingly in charge of her 7 year old cousin Arrun.
Her crush Sam has an Egyptian dad.
The town they live in has a legacy of a horror novelist who died in the 1800's by the name of Addison Greer. Addison died if typhoid. But her stories live on. When Halloween comes around, they do it up.
One Halloween, Addison comes alive through a book.
So do all her monsters. She kills townsfolk and terrifies Thulasi until she gets what she wants.
Thanks to NetGalley for the opportunity to read this in exchange for an honest review.
This book was a coming of age of sorts. We know what it's like for oldest born girls, and/or girls who might be expected to take on maternal roles for their younger siblings and cousins with no thought to their autonomy. It's well written and has a lot of tense moments when the monsters attack. My only qualm was Thulasi still be affected by Addison after everything.
But not just that. Thulasi the MC is a high school age girl navigating life in a small town being one of the very few POC. She's Tamil and always seemingly in charge of her 7 year old cousin Arrun.
Her crush Sam has an Egyptian dad.
The town they live in has a legacy of a horror novelist who died in the 1800's by the name of Addison Greer. Addison died if typhoid. But her stories live on. When Halloween comes around, they do it up.
One Halloween, Addison comes alive through a book.
So do all her monsters. She kills townsfolk and terrifies Thulasi until she gets what she wants.
Thanks to NetGalley for the opportunity to read this in exchange for an honest review.
This book was a coming of age of sorts. We know what it's like for oldest born girls, and/or girls who might be expected to take on maternal roles for their younger siblings and cousins with no thought to their autonomy. It's well written and has a lot of tense moments when the monsters attack. My only qualm was Thulasi still be affected by Addison after everything.
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
2.5 but I’ll round up because I love Halloween. This was like a woke version of Hocus Pocus. Only they already made that - HP 2 and that book sucked. This was better. But it got a little weird when the FMC was conveniently bi and also polyamorous. This book would have worked better as a middle grade to focus on the details and the horror. Because as a YA with a subplot of the FMC of color finding herself and her autonomy, it was a bit distracting from the main plot. People are dying left and right but Thulasi can’t help but be feel so many feelings- just not about the killings. Also a lot of the characters’ actions didn’t make sense. They just seemed like how someone would act if they were trying to pretend to me a hero in a drama. Like those people who make cringe vids with the anime dub voice. The clenched fist. “I will avenge you!” Eh. I love me some Halloween. And this had the horror and the potential. But it just wanted to be too many things.
Review of advance copy received from Author
This was such an amazingly perfect spooky YA debut!!! (thank you to the author, @yuvanissue for gifting me this physical arc and trusting me to read and review your wonderful book)
⭐️KILL YOUR DARLINGS, out SEPT 2026⭐️
I knew when the book started off on Halloween it was going to be a true treattttt (no pun intended 😂)! It composed all the fun and exhilarating parts of say Jumanji (out of a book, trouble ensues), but with the spookiness and horror elements of say, ‘The Haunting of Hill House’ and ‘Are You Afraid of the Dark?’ and a babysitting misadventure in the realm of ‘Adventures in Babysitting’! It also had its own spooky betch set out on revenge à la ‘Maleficent’
I was completely enthralled by the fast-paced fun of the book and @yuvanissue ‘s writing style! This was a quick bingeable read that I’ll definitely be picking up again come spooky szn!!! I could (and will) seriously read every and anything from this author in the future!
#killyourdarlings #yuvashriharish #putnam
⭐️KILL YOUR DARLINGS, out SEPT 2026⭐️
I knew when the book started off on Halloween it was going to be a true treattttt (no pun intended 😂)! It composed all the fun and exhilarating parts of say Jumanji (out of a book, trouble ensues), but with the spookiness and horror elements of say, ‘The Haunting of Hill House’ and ‘Are You Afraid of the Dark?’ and a babysitting misadventure in the realm of ‘Adventures in Babysitting’! It also had its own spooky betch set out on revenge à la ‘Maleficent’
I was completely enthralled by the fast-paced fun of the book and @yuvanissue ‘s writing style! This was a quick bingeable read that I’ll definitely be picking up again come spooky szn!!! I could (and will) seriously read every and anything from this author in the future!
#killyourdarlings #yuvashriharish #putnam
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews