Review: Girl of Nightmares (Anna, #2) by Kendare Blake

Girl of Nightmares (Anna, #2) by Kendare Blake

Author: Kendare Blake
Publication Date: August 7, 2012
Publisher: Tor Teen
Pages: 332
Genre: YA, Fantasy, Paranormal
Source: Bought it
Description from Goodreads: 
It's been months since the ghost of Anna Korlov opened a door to Hell in her basement and disappeared into it, but ghost-hunter Cas Lowood can't move on. 

His friends remind him that Anna sacrificed herself so that Cas could live—not walk around half dead. He knows they're right, but in Cas's eyes, no living girl he meets can compare to the dead girl he fell in love with.

Now he's seeing Anna everywhere: sometimes when he's asleep and sometimes in waking nightmares. But something is very wrong...these aren't just daydreams. Anna seems tortured, torn apart in new and ever more gruesome ways every time she appears.

Cas doesn't know what happened to Anna when she disappeared into Hell, but he knows she doesn't deserve whatever is happening to her now. Anna saved Cas more than once, and it's time for him to return the favor.

Review:

     When I read the first book Anna Dressed in Blood, I compared it to Supernatural. Especially with the ending where Anna goes to Hell and Cas desperately wants to know what became of her. I was afraid Blake was going to keep beating the dead horse with a stick exactly like Supernatural and the two of them would be trapped in a never ending loop of sacrifice. I'm glad to say that this ISN'T the case with Girl of Nightmares!

     I love these cover so much. The gorgeously rendered Anna is set in a smoldering hell with tortured souls grasping at her. She has this look that lures you into the pages of her story.

      It's been months after Anna's sacrifice, Cas has decided to stay in Thunder Bay, Ontario and live a semi-normal life. As normal as it gets when you hunt ghosts on the side with your mini-ghost buster club of friends: Thomas the psychic witch and Carmel the pretty and popular sidekick. What should have been a routine hunt for them, a simple lure and stab quickly dissolves into a dire situation when Anna suddenly shows up looking tortured and desperate. Anna keeps appearing, but to Cas only and his nightmares of her agony start to bleed into reality as his friends worry he's losing his mind. Cas has been hunting for answers since that night, but he pursues it ferociously now that he's seen Anna again. 

      Cas in the beginning is a hollow shell of the hunter he once was. The obsession and puzzle that is Anna has completely consumed him. It's made him a bit more reckless and it nearly costs him his friends. The way Blake executes the scenes with Anna pulls the reader into the love that Cas has for Anna as well as the debt he feels that needs to be paid - and a hunter always pays his debts. He has a dogged determination to figure things out, that hasn't changed and he starts regaining his confidence when a more concrete plan develops. At the end I was back to cheering for our headstrong Cas! 

     Thomas has grown so much over his time with Cas. He still has moments where he's a bit shy and quiet, but he's a bit more inclined to forge is own path now and he isn't going to take crap from people anymore. His loyalty to Cas was awe inspiring, he's the kind of unwavering friend that anyone would want by their side to the bitter end. Carmel will always be that character that completely surprises me. Just when I think I've gotten her figured out and I'm disappointed in her she comes back with an ass kicking vengeance! 

     I found that the beginning of Girl of Nightmares was a bit slow. It builds up Anna's situation interspersed with some action packed ghost hunts. It also takes a deeper look into the history of the athame. It's a knife full of secrets and those who would kill for the athame. But when all the pieces are in place in the last half of the story, Blake doesn't give you a moment's rest until Cas' blood debt is paid!

     Blake always creates amazing creepy scenes, but she might have outdone herself this time with a certain forest at the end. I won't tell you what happens, but if you've ever seen the new Dr. Who episodes where they feature the Weeping Angels you'll know how terrifying it can get. 

     The ending was absolutely perfect, we get closure and the major strings are tied up. It's left a bit open ended so that Blake could come back to it in a whole new way if she wanted, but for now it's definitely enough.

Overall: 5/5 Steaming HOT Cups of Tea!

It started out as a 4/5 - I liked it well enough, but the ending just blew everything I thought I knew out of the water! 

     

Review: Anna Dressed in Blood by Kendare Blake

Anna Dressed in Blood (Anna #1) by Kendare Blake

Author: Kendare Blake

Publication Date: August 30, 2011

Publisher: Tor Teen

Pages: 316

Genre: YA, Urban Fantasy, Paranormal Romance, Ghosts

Source: Borrowed from Library

Book Description from Goodreads:

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.

Review:

I thoroughly traumatized myself with ghost films as a kid and for the longest time I couldn’t watch them without huddling under a blanket and keeping a night light on. It wasn’t until I saw my first episode of Supernatural back in 2005 that I really got over my fear of ghosts because I realized that “Hey there’s really good looking guys that hunt ghosts and there’s totally rational ways to fight them”. It was their sense of finality at the end of the episodes that made me realize, well the ghost is gone and there’s nothing to fear (most of the time). This sense of safety is what I immediately felt upon beginning to read Anna Dressed in Blood. Cas Lowood embodies the Supernatural hunter vibe with cool confidence and deadly skills as he takes on “the family business”.

The cover features a gorgeous and haunting Anna in her signature white dress dripping with blood amid her Victorian home swirled in fog. I love the black and whiteness of the cover with accents of blood red! The version I read also featured a rusted blood red color for the font that compliments the mood of the story.

The story begins with Cas taking the reader through the logistics of ghost hunting, from the research to the props and finally the execution. I was immediately hooked by the rich details and the histories of the ghosts he hunts.

Cas has taken over ghost hunting ever since the death of his father at the hands of a very powerful and mysterious supernatural entity. As Cas and his witch mother move from one town to another in search of ghosts to put down, while Cas plans his revenge on the creature that killed his father. We end up in the Canadian city of Thunder Bay, Ontario as Cas follow’s Anna’s bloody trail to her doorstep.

Cas’ character is strong, confident (maybe a bit overconfident at times) and he has a hilarious sarcastic sense of humour. He’s got a very lone ranger method to ghost hunting and has a few acquaintances that he gets information from around the world. So when he moves to a new place he makes it his business to stay remote, and avoids making friends, but he definitely knows how to turn the charm on to get what he wants.

Anna’s ghost has a history that’s been shrouded in local legend and with all places that are haunted there are always drunk teenagers that stumble in to test their courage. Only this time, it’s not just a story and Anna is one of the most powerful ghosts that Cas has ever seen. The dichotomy of Anna’s character is what’s so interesting about her. One on hand she’s a blood fuelled, terrifying violent spirit that has an ever increasing body count to her name, but on the other hand with Cas the hurt she’s been through is visible as well as a lonely human side. When we finally find out her story, it was heartbreaking, and something completely out of left field. Anna also manages to get Cas out of being a tunnel vision hunter, she makes him question what he’s doing if it’s as righteous as he feels it is, she pretty much shakes up Cas’ whole life and it really makes him grow up a bit.

The secondary characters were an amazing cast who Cas originally only befriended because he needed them for their respective knowledge and skills, but they end up turning into something more. In turn each character such as Thomas who’s quite shy and a loner gets more courageous and Carmel, who I originally disliked because I figured she was the super peppy popular girl whose only skill is to scream, actually turned out to be pretty bad ass, and a great friend.

What Cas thought was just another job turned into something far more dangerous than just figuring out Anna’s story. There were so many twists and turns in this story that definitely kept me hooked all the way to the dramatic ending! Blake’s writing is so descriptive and it works well for when we’re taken back in time to recount the ghost’s moments before death. She also writes some really graphic- eye popping violence scenes and introduces some new aspects to ghosts that I’ve never really thought of before. I also love Blake’s little nods to Canadians by setting the story in a Canadian city, and things like Saskatoon Berry Jam (which is delicious by the way!).

Rating: 5/5 Steaming HOT Cups of tea! 

Overall this is definitely an amazing ghost story! If you’re a fan of Supernatural, then pick this one up!