Review: Anna Dressed in Blood by Kendra Blake





Just your average boy-meets-girl, girl-kills-people story...
Cas Lowood has inherited an unusual vocation: He kills the dead.
So did his father before him, until his gruesome murder by a ghost he sought to kill. Now, armed with his father’s mysterious and deadly athame, Cas travels the country with his kitchen-witch mother and their spirit-sniffing cat. Together they follow legends and local lore, trying to keep up with the murderous dead—keeping pesky things like the future and friends at bay.
When they arrive in a new town in search of a ghost the locals call Anna Dressed in Blood, Cas doesn’t expect anything outside of the ordinary: move, hunt, kill. What he finds instead is a girl entangled in curses and rage, a ghost like he’s never faced before. She still wears the dress she wore on the day of her brutal murder in 1958: once white, but now stained red and dripping blood. Since her death, Anna has killed any and every person who has dared to step into the deserted Victorian she used to call home.
And she, for whatever reason, spares his life (goodreads)



1/2
I can never get into hyped up books. Seriously. I don't know if it is because my expectations are too damn high or I just have different tastes in books, but this book was just an "interesting" read for me.

The book opens with Cas hunting a murderous ghost. Immediately Blake sets the tone for the book, and draws the attention to every paranormal/ Supernatural fan on the internet. I must give Kendra Blake kudos for her constantly-moving plot and her gruesome scenes, I love an author who isn't afraid to scare the bejebus out of her readers. I mean people being split in half? That is AWESOME!

What I wasn't impressed by were the characters. I liked them individually but I did not like them as a functioning group, I don't know I just wasn't impressed. Now here is the reason I couldn't give Anna Dressed in Blood more than 3 1/2 stars: I didn't like Anna. I know know, she was such a badass. But she didn't feel real. I didn't sympathize with her monsrous nature, nor did I sympathize with her when I learned the cause of her death. I just didn't feel a connection. And although I am the biggest sucker of forbidden romances, I didn't believe in Anna and Cas's love. To me, it was extremely superficial with not foundation. 

The writing was excellent. Like I stated earlier, Blake does not hold back when it comes to death scenes (although there is one furry death that I could have lived without...) and that's what kept my attention. 





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