Book Review: Anna Dressed in Blood by Kendare Blake

Book Title & Author: Anna Dressed in Blood (Anna #1) by Kendare Blake
Published by: Tor Teen on October 17th, 2011
Genres: Horror, Paranormal
Pages: 316
Format: Paperback
Source: Purchased
Goodreads
🌟🌟1/2

Synopsis: Cas Lowood has inherited an unusual vocation: He kills the dead.

So did his father before him, until he was gruesomely murdered 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. They follow legends and local lore, destroy the murderous dead, and keep pesky things like the future and friends at bay.

Searching for a ghost the locals call Anna Dressed in Blood, Cas expects the usual: track, 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, now stained red and dripping with 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.

Yet she spares Cas's life.

Review:
I've had this book on my TBR for a really long time, like for as long as I've been blogging, which is 5 1/2 years, but I only recently got a copy of it. I decided to read it last month because I thought it would be a creepy story, perfect for Halloween. I don't scare easily, so I was hoping that this book would scare me. I really wanted a scary Halloween read.

Unfortunately, the book didn't scare me, although the strongest aspect of the book was the setting. The way the story was told was very creepy, but I felt no chills, no reason to keep turning around to see what was behind me and no real feelings of fear and panic. In a book like this, those are the things I look for and in this case, I actually think it was the characters that weakened the book for me.

I couldn't really connect with Cas or Thomas or Carmel or any of the other characters in this book and I think that was the book's biggest problem. I guess I shouldn't have expected to connect with a ghost killer, but I was hoping. The simple title of "ghost killer" caused me to suspend reality a bit and that threw me off. I mean, logically I know ghosts are already dead, you can't actually kill them. I do actually believe in ghosts and I have seen them before, but Cas (and his father's) job of hunting & killing ghosts was definitely a struggle for me to accept & deal with.

The character development was also not as strong as it could have been and I think that was another reason that I couldn't really connect to the characters. I usually connect to well rounded & well developed characters and with the exception of Anna, I didn't feel like the characters in this book were all that well rounded or well developed. I actually really liked Anna though and she was definitely the most interesting character in the entire book. I was super curious to figure out how she was murdered and thankfully, we got that answered in this book.

Final thoughts: Aside from Anna herself, the characters were not well developed. The setting was creepy though. This book was just not my cup of tea.

Book Review: The Dark Beneath the Ice by Amelinda Berube

Book Title & Author: The Dark Beneath the Ice by Amelinda Berube
Published by: Sourcebooks Fire on August 7th, 2018
Genre: Horror, Paranormal
Pages: 320
Format: eARC
Source: Publisher
Goodreads
🌟🌟🌟
Synopsis: Something is wrong with Marianne. 

It's not just that her parents have split up, or that life hasn't been the same since she quit dancing. Or even that her mother has checked herself into the hospital. 
She's losing time. Doing things she would never do. And objects around her seem to break whenever she comes close. 
Something is after her. But a first attempt at an exorcism calls down the full force of the thing's rage. It demands Marianne give back what she stole. And Marianne must uncover the truth that lies beneath it all before the nightmare can take what it think it's owed, leaving Marianne trapped in the darkness of the other side.

Review:
I had been looking for a really good horror book lately, so I was excited to pick this one up. It looked really good and I couldn't help but be excited just based off the cover alone. The cover pulls you right in and that's what first excited me about this book.

So I dove into the book with excitement and high expectations. Maybe I shouldn't have had such high expectations because while it was an okay book, it was nothing like I was hoping it would be. The writing was actually my favorite part because it was so atmospheric and creepy. It actually reminded me of Nova Ren Suma's writing. I don't think I've ever read another book where the writing was like Suma's.

I did like that Marianne had an aunt that was so present in her life. We don't get to see extended family much in YA, so I feel like whenever we do, I have to at least make a mention of it. Marianne's Aunt Jen was a good surprise and I actually liked how she interacted with Marianne and how she interacted with her troubled sister.

I couldn't stand Marianne's father. In fact, I felt like he was a selfish man who ran when things got hard. And by things, I mean his wife's mental health. He called his wife's "episodes" Hurricane Laura. I mean, how much more unsupportive could he be? When he called Marianne's mom "Hurricane Laura" I almost always wanted to slap him. I know it's not easy to live with someone who has mental health issues, but he married her for better or worse and when things got "worse" he ran like a bat out of hell. Ugh, I cannot STAND that.

My heart broke for Marianne's mother. I couldn't imagine being so afraid of hurting people I loved. I couldn't imagine what was going on in her head. I couldn't imagine hoe scared she must have been when certain things started happening and she thought she was the cause of them. And to have her husband just walk out on her like that. Just because she was struggling with her mental health.

What I wasn't expecting was Marianne's romance subplot, but oh my god, I think I loved it more than I expected to. It was grin-worthy. I don't think I've ever used that phrase before, certainly not in a review, but I loved this romance. It brought some peace to the insanity that was Marianne's life.

I ended up being really disappointed by the horror/paranormal aspects of this book. I cannot believe I have to say this, but I was expecting something much scarier as the book continued on, and in fact, it got less scary and more confusing as the book went on.

Final thoughts: This book disappointed me in the paranormal/horror aspects, but for people who scare easily, this is a decent book to dip your toe in if you want to try horror. 

Recent Reads (11)

Obisido (The Illuminae Files #3) by Jay Kristoff and Amie Kaufman
Published by Knopf Books for Young Readers on March 13th, 2018
Genre: science fiction
Format: Hardcover
Source: Purchased
Pages: 615
Goodreads
🌟🌟🌟🌟

Kady, Ezra, Hanna, and Nik narrowly escaped with their lives from the attacks on Heimdall station and now find themselves crammed with 2,000 refugees on the container ship, Mao. With the jump station destroyed and their resources scarce, the only option is to return to Kerenza—but who knows what they'll find seven months after the invasion?

Meanwhile, Kady's cousin, Asha, survived the initial BeiTech assault and has joined Kerenza's ragtag underground resistance. When Rhys—an old flame from Asha's past—reappears on Kerenza, the two find themselves on opposite sides of the conflict.

With time running out, a final battle will be waged on land and in space, heroes will fall, and hearts will be broken.

Holy shitballs you guys.

Somehow I always go into the Illuminae books not expecting to get blown away. And every single time... I AM. My mind is always blown by the characters, the plot, the writing, the genius. Not only the story, but the vast well of talent these authors draw from. It's incredible and intimidating how good they are. And they just keep surprising me. Even when I CALL a twist. Even when I see things coming from a klick away. They still manage to get me somehow. It's a wild experience, and not one that I think any other writer (or writer duo) can ever replicate.

It took me a little longer to get into Obsidio than it did the others. I was immediately drawn in by Kady in Illuminae and everything about Nik and Hannah in Gemina was my aesthetic. But it took a really long time for me to warm up to Rhys and Asha. To begin with, the POV was much more scattered in this book than in the first two; and also there was a LOT of plot to put together here, which made the initial introduction to the new pairing falter a bit. I didn't even up with heart crushing feelings for those to romantically like I did the first two couples. But it ended up being fine because by the end I did have an overall "protect my children at all costs" feeling toward them that I think was the main goal anyway.

Another shining light of this finale is ADIAN. I kind of felt like it was going a little bit soft in book 2, but it's back to its villainous, glitchy ways in Obsidio. What made it especially compelling this time was what made it scary in the first book: its willing to do whatever it takes to save the fleet. By the end, after all it had done, I couldn't believe I had actually developed feels over AIDAN. But I did. One of the many times I cried throughout my reading was over AIDAN.

Man, if you're on the fence about finishing this series, I HIGHLY recommend you go for it. It has everything, from humor and banter to shippy feels to crazy plot twists and just so much action packed fun. You'll cheer, you'll laugh, you'll cry. You'll hold your breath through the last 300 pages. It's amazing and everything and I loved it.

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Anya's Ghost by Vera Brosgol
Published by First Second on June 7th, 2011
Genres: Graphic novel, paranormal
Pages: 211
Format: eBook
Source: Library
Goodreads
🌟🌟🌟

Anya could really use a friend. But her new BFF isn't kidding about the "Forever" part.

Of all the things Anya expected to find at the bottom of an old well, a new friend was not one of them. Especially not a new friend who’s been dead for a century.

Falling down a well is bad enough, but Anya's normal life might actually be worse. She's embarrassed by her family, self-conscious about her body, and she's pretty much given up on fitting in at school. A new friend—even a ghost—is just what she needs.

Or so she thinks. Spooky, sardonic, and secretly sincere, Anya's Ghost is a wonderfully entertaining debut from author/artist Vera Brosgol.

So, going into this I had no idea what it was going to be about. And I'm not really sure IT knew either. Anya's Ghost tackles a handful of subjects--immigration, community, eating disorders, a murder mystery, friendships, self-esteem--but only really does two of them well. My biggest problem was that the story lacked focus.

What I did really like were the surprising turns in the story. Like I said, I knew nothing about this plot when I started so each new revelation about Emily I found to be surprising and fun. I didn't see at all where this was going. In the beginning I honestly thought this little ghost girl was going to help Anya through an eating disorder--especially when Emily was talking about how she starved to death at the bottom of the well. But it actually turned out to be a little more sinister than that and I really enjoyed the story.

But I wish the eating disorder stuff had been left out. I thought it was treated very, very poorly. Like an afterthought. When the novel starts you see Anya avoiding food, fat, grease, etc. She smokes cigarettes ostensibly to curb her appetite. And then we see one panel where she looks in the mirror and sees a much larger version of herself than is reality. But that's it. Once the ghost plot takes off, the disordered eating is forgotten. Readers with this type of mental illness deserve a lot better.

I will say that I very much enjoyed the parts about immigration and assimilating to a new community. Anya and her family came to America from Russia when Anya was young. She worked on getting rid of her accent and other traits about her that marked her as visibly Other. There is another Russian character who hasn't done those things to erase his own culture. I am not an immigrant, so I really do not have any idea what this struggle is like. But I did enjoy the two approaches to fitting into a new community, and that Anya seemed to find a healthier balance by the end of the book.

Despite some misgivings, I did find this to be enjoyable. However, if you have disordered eating in any way, I would be aware that there is some of that in here.