Review: Anna Dressed in Blood

 Info:
Title: Anna Dressed in Blood
Author: Kendare Blake
Series: Anna #1
Publisher: Tor Teen
Publication Date: September 2011
Source: Purchased..

Synopsis:
Cas Lowood, armed with his late father's athame knife, kills ghosts. In Thunder Bay, Anna, forever 16, drips blood on her white dress from throat slit in 1958, and rips apart anyone who enters her house - except Cas. He makes new friends - high school queen Carmel, jock Will, admiring nerd Thomas and Tom's voodoo grandpa Morfran - to fight this demon.

Review:
Anna Dressed in Blood is another case of a book not quite living up to the hype. Everyone I talked to loved it and as Halloween approached, it felt like everyone was talking about it as their favourite scary read. It didn't help that I also had the ending spoilered a bit.

Now, I didn't think Anna was a bad book. It just didn't come close to the hype surrounding it for me. I didn't really connect with Cas and at time I found his voice to be unrealistic, even for someone who's life is as messed up as his. Anna felt a bit flat to me; she didn't have tons of personality. She went from being crazy-ass-scary to feeling a bit bland to me.

The other major issue I had was with the romance. I kind of got blind-sided by it. While I wouldn't classify it as instalove, it felt very sudden for me. Maybe I'm really dense and missed some clues, but it felt like Cas woke up one day and was suddenly in love.

I did like the plot, although I wish Cas had killed more ghosts though the book. That part of the story reminds me of season one of Supernatural, which I loved. Also, the baddie at the end was pretty bad-ass. Voodoo freaks me out a bit anyway, which made things even creepier.

Overall, I'm finding this one difficult to review. I'm not sure how I would have felt if I'd read this one right when it came out, but as it stands, it was nothing special for me. With that said, I do still plan to read Girl of Nightmares and I already have a copy of Blake's new book, Antigoddess, which I'm excited for.

Find the Book:
Goodreads | Amazon | The Book Depository

Find the Author:
Goodreads | Web | Twitter | Facebook 

Don't Just Take My Word For It:
The Daily Prophecy | Xpresso Reads | Novel Heartbeat