Anna Dressed in Blood (Anna, #1) in And So It Begins Reading Challenge

Aug 13, 2012 Darlene rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: books-i-own, audiobook, read-in-2012, 2012-dusty-bookshelf-challenge, 2012-ya-audiobook-challenge, 2012-horror-thriller-reading-challe

Anna Dressed in Blood is the literary version of the television show, Supernatural! It has won a few literary awards including: 2011 Cybils Award Nominee for Fantasy & Science Fiction (Young Adult), YALSA 2012 Quick Picks for Reluctant Young Readers, and YALSA 2012 Best Fiction for Young Adults.

Theseus Cassio Lowood (“Cas”) is a 17 year-old ghost-hunter, and he comes from a long line of ghost-hunters. His father was recently killed by a ghost, and Cas feels that it is his place to carry on this Anna Dressed in Blood is the literary version of the television show, Supernatural! It has won a few literary awards including: 2011 Cybils Award Nominee for Fantasy & Science Fiction (Young Adult), YALSA 2012 Quick Picks for Reluctant Young Readers, and YALSA 2012 Best Fiction for Young Adults.

Theseus Cassio Lowood (“Cas”) is a 17 year-old ghost-hunter, and he comes from a long line of ghost-hunters. His father was recently killed by a ghost, and Cas feels that it is his place to carry on this unusual vocation. He receives tips from all over the world about malevolent ghosts, and he travels with his mom from place to place hunting them and sending them back to Hell with his athame, which is a special dagger that is made with the blood of his ancestors. His mom is a white witch, and she purifies his athame after each kill.

Cas gets a tip about a ghost named Anna Korlov, otherwise known as Anna Dressed in Blood, and he and his mom travel to Thunder Bay in Ontario, Canada. The urban legend is that Anna has been killing people for decades, tearing apart anyone who enters her house which stands vacant. In order that he can get “in the know” in Thunder Bay, Cas targets the most popular girl in school, Carmel Jones, and makes friends with her. Too bad for Cas that her boyfriend, Mike Andover, is the jealous type. Carmel invites Cas to a party with her friends, and he uses the opportunity to his advantage to find out more about the local hauntings. It turns out better than he expects when the group decides to take a trip out to Anna’s house.

Mike and his sidekick, Chase Putnam, usher Cas up the front steps of the abandoned Victorian house. Mike whacks Cas over the head with a board, and he takes the unconscious Cas into the house and leaves him there. When Cas awakens, he becomes aware of a presence with him and is confused because he doesn’t understand how he came to be in the house! He sees who can only be Anna, in a white dress dripping with blood, and watches her as she pulls Mike through the window into the house and tears him limb from limb. While this chaos is going on, someone grabs Cas under his arms and drags him out of the house. His saviour is Thomas Sabin, the quiet boy from school who can read minds. Thomas didn’t come to Anna’s house with Carmel’s friends, so he must have sensed that something bad was going to happen.

Cas should feel driven to kill Anna, but he doesn’t feel threatened by her. Oddly enough, he feels that she does not pose any risk to him. He wants to learn how Anna was killed and why she is on a killing spree, and he will do whatever it takes to find those answers.

Kendare Blake is a new-to-me author, and I really enjoyed this book! I am a fan of ghostly stories and urban legends, and I was immediately drawn to the book. I had hoped that this book would be the kind of book that would make me afraid to turn the lights out at night, so I was a little disappointed that it wasn’t scarier. Nevertheless, it was still a good story.

This is my first narration by August Ross, and I have mixed feelings about him. I feel that his voice is actually perfectly suited for adolescent Cas, and he does a nice job conveying Cas’ smart-alecky attitude. However, his characterizations (especially the females) leave a lot to be desired. His voice for Thomas sounded off to me. Blake paints Thomas as a quiet and reserved boy who is a little nerdy, geeky, and extremely smart. I was expecting a higher-pitched meeker voice, not a low, breathy, oafish voice. Ross’s enunciation is crisp and clear, but I believe that his attention to it interferes with the flow of the story. The result is a narration that is slow, stilted, and choppy. I have never said this before, and I am cringing as I type it, but the narration actually left me feeling a bit discontented. I think this is one of those rare occasions where I would have preferred reading the book instead of listening to it.

MY RATING: 4 stars!! It was really good! You should put it on your "To Be Read" list. ...more

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Feb 07, 2011 Georgia rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites

I cannot believe how long I waited to read this book. Five stars were being thrown at it from every angle, but no. Of course I never picked it up. Then one day, there I saw Anna, staring at me. (Or rather, the back of her head staring at me) So I picked it up, and wow, just imagine if I didn’t.

I would never have slept with the light on all night, I would never have babbled to everyone everything that was happening in the book and what I thought the characters should do next. And most of all, I ...more

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Aug 29, 2011 thuy rated it really liked it

Shelves: review-written, 52-books-in-52-weeks-2011, young-adult

Kendare Blake blends horror and teen angst into a delightfully creepy novel that will have you staying up late at night and turning on all the lights. It’s been awhile since I’ve been scared by a book but Anna Dressed In Blood managed it thoroughly. Cas, a jaded 17-year-old, has followed in his father’s footsteps to become a hunter of angry ghost spirits. In Blake’s world, when someone dies a violent death, they don’t always go away to where they are meant to. In her world, both good and bad peo Kendare Blake blends horror and teen angst into a delightfully creepy novel that will have you staying up late at night and turning on all the lights. It’s been awhile since I’ve been scared by a book but Anna Dressed In Blood managed it thoroughly. Cas, a jaded 17-year-old, has followed in his father’s footsteps to become a hunter of angry ghost spirits. In Blake’s world, when someone dies a violent death, they don’t always go away to where they are meant to. In her world, both good and bad people can come back as dark, twisted ghosts that lure the living to horrible deaths. Cas stops them by tracking them and setting a trap. Then he uses his mystical athame to send them away to parts unknown. Ghost killing is a gory business and Blake’s descriptions are often gruesome and chilling.

Cas is a complex character. Afraid to let anyone too close, he isolates himself and avoids making any real human connections. I admire Cas but I don’t always like him. He’s cocky and his snarkiness, especially towards those who want to help him, gets old. His father’s death has also made him bitter and serious. But he is also loyal and protective and I liked him more as the book went on. Forced to work with others for the first time, he learns to trust his friends.

Let’s not forget Anna. When we first meet her she is tearing a human body to pieces - one of many people we’ve been told that Anna has killed over the years. She is vicious and terrible but, we learn, she may not be evil. Complicated? You bet. But Blake deftly manages Anna’s evolution from angry, murderous spirit into someone you can sympathize with. Along with Cas and Anna, there is an interesting cast of secondary characters. New friends Tim and Carmel are opposites in the school heirarchy. One is awkward and dabbles in magic and the other is the school’s queen bee, but both are more than their reputations. Morfran, Will, Cas’s mother and their ghost sniffing cat Tybalt round out the eclectic group.

At times frightening, tragic, funny and creepy, Anna Dressed In Blood is a gripping read that you’ll have a hard time putting down. I look forward to Anna’s return in the sequel, Girl Of Nightmares, coming out next year. ...more

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Jul 15, 2012 Kam Brooksmoore rated it it was amazing

Shelves: horror, young-adult

This is the first book that I read that ACTUALLY scared me! I've read boatloads of scary books... but none have kept me up at night like this one. It was an AMAZING book with great ideas, plot and characters. Each character has their own personality and none of them are the same. I reccomend this to anyone who is searching for a good book. thanks for reading this review... chow! ...more

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