How Writing Became a Part of My Life: A Guest Post by Jenni Howell
Dangerous, dark and dazzling, Boys with Sharp Teeth is a decadent tale of academia, secrets and lies with a supernatural twist. Read on for an exclusive essay from Jenni Howell on writing her debut novel, Boys with Sharp Teeth.
Hardcover $19.99
Boys with Sharp Teeth
Boys with Sharp Teeth
By Jenni Howell
In Stock Online
Hardcover $19.99
We Were Liars meets The Raven Boys in this mind-bending YA debut about dark revenge, twisted desire, and the sinister secrets lurking behind the walls of an elite boarding school.
We Were Liars meets The Raven Boys in this mind-bending YA debut about dark revenge, twisted desire, and the sinister secrets lurking behind the walls of an elite boarding school.
2 A.M., exhausted but held wide awake by anxious, screaming thoughts—that’s how writing became a part of my life. As a way to turn the emotions and fears that held me far too tight into something honest, if not beautiful.
Not once had I dreamed of being an author. I was a lifelong reader. Books were my shield growing up, carried for protection everywhere I went. When people got too loud, deadlines too demanding, expectations too heavy, I could disappear simply by opening their well-worn covers. Creating that magic shelter myself seemed audacious, not adventurous. I never put a pen to page unless it was assigned. Never dreamed of making my own characters, content to doodle hearts around Lan al’Mandragoran and Drizzt instead. It wasn’t until I was a mom of four, in my mid-thirties, that I fell into writing because the only other option was to struggle for each and every breath.
So, I fell. And I found myself.
That moment, where an almost accidental decision uncovers the foundations of your soul, is the revelation I relentlessly chased for the characters of BOYS WITH SHARP TEETH. Marin, Henry, and Adrian are all running from so many things. Redemption, hope, love, justice; despite how much they talk about being alive, few of them let their true selves live. Because sometimes the scariest thing is finding that one person or thing that makes you feel like you’re actually you.
For me, that’s words. And that was enough to keep me going through hundreds of thousands of practice words. Through myriad rejections and unending revisions. I learned how to write on this book. Maybe I learned how to write for this book. It’s full of nightmares and terror, but it’s also full of the potential for love. The hope of redemption hides behind each corner, calling the characters to turn aside from their hate and hurt. They never do. They race each other into the dark. Hope, after all, is always a choice.
Debuting with this novel has been one blazingly bright moment after the next. Goals I’d thought were ten and twenty years down the road have been met within months. But publishing BOYS WITH SHARP TEETH has also meant taking my shield and laying it down for others to step inside my protected space. I’m no longer alone and hiding. Sometimes I still lie awake at night, wrestling with my fears.
But I’m finally breathing.
And I’m so, so hopeful that my book will give you the space to slow down and breathe, too.