Anna Dressed in Blood: Australia [Hardcover]

Anna Dressed in Blood is an exciting and terrifying novel that will leave readers breathless and prepared for more. Looking for a frightful summer read? Then pick up this book.

Cas isn't a normal teenager. He has a job to hunt and kill the dead who still haunt at the place of their death. When Cas and his mum move to a new town, Cas has his mind set on a very famous ghost: Anna Dressed in Blood. He's only heard rumors and stories. Anna has killed every single person who has entered her home. So when Cas and his school mates visit the house Anna does something no ones expects. She spares his life.

I found this book really interesting and completely gripping. This book is told from a male's POV, which is great because YA fiction needs more of them. It's all one exciting and scary-as-hell roller-coaster. Get ready for blood, guts and a whole load of ghosts.

Cas is strong, determined and brave. I loved reading the scenes between him and Anna when they have the chance to talk to each other. His life is extremely intriguing and sad at the same time. He was not able to have a decent childhood due to the fact that he has the duty to kill ghosts.

I loved the suspense, the mystery, the action, the romance and the characters. One thing I didn't like so much was the book started pretty slow and I was waiting for something exciting to happen 60 pages in. The book did get more interesting but it felt like the plot was going round in circles a bit. I would have liked to see more talking going on between Anna and Cas but I guess I'll have to wait for the sequel.

Overall, Anna Dressed in Blood is one of the most freakiest books I've ever read! It had me biting my nails and checking behind doors after I'd read it. A definite recommend. I can not wait to read Girl of Nightmares.

I'm not one to gush about book and be all fan-girly - have you ever seen me do that? No. So mark down this day in history 'cos - I LOVED THIS BOOK! I read it in a day - a day I'd planned to do a lot of other things, but I just couldn't put this down. I loved the story, I loved the spookiness and I especially (brace yourself) loved Cas. Yep, I'm confessing my first EVER book boy crush.

Right - I need to justify all this gushing *takes deep, calming breaths*.

Anna Dressed in Blood is unusual in the YA-paranormal genre in that it is written in first-person perspective of a male character, Cas. And Cas is a great character - he's snarky and smart-arsey, clever and funny, brave and strong (yeah, there's the gush again) - his looks aren't really described but I did imagine him as kinda like Dean from Supernatural, it's the personality that I loved so much! And Anna, my heart broke more than a little when her story was revealed......

Although Anna Dressed in Blood is not one of the scariest books I've ever read, the creep factor is pretty high - the ghosts are scary as all get-out and any scene featuring them got my heebies jeeby-ing, it's subtly written but quite intricately detailed as well.

There's also romance (which had me all misty-eyed), magic and some surprising characters - the popular girl from the local high school Cas attends, Carmel, actually isn't the stereotypical bitchy bimbo at all, and Cas' mother is not the overbearing overprotective character I would have assumed the mother of a ghost-hunting teenage boy would be.

The writing in Anna Dressed in Blood is extremely good, the pace is maintained even when the ghosts aren't around and the action scenes had me sitting on the edge of my seat. The dialogue is great - it really cements the personalities of the characters and I could almost hear them in my head (I can't admit that I DID hear them, that sounds slightly crazy!). Of course, being a series, there is a cliffhanger - but not the kind that made me want to throw the book across the room, more the kind that had me hugging the book and beginning to stalk Ms. Blake to see when the next book is being released....

Anna Dressed in Blood is one of my favourite books of 2012 so far, if not THE favourite.

Cas Lowood is no ordinary teenage boy. He doesn't care about sports or computers and he isn't interested in girls. He hunts ghosts.

His latest hunt takes him to Thunder Bay, Ontario, where a violent spirit known as Anna Dressed in Blood haunts the town, brutally murdering anyone who dares to stray into her home.

Everyone except Cas...

The sole reason I chose to read this book was the title. Anna Dressed in Blood has quite an old fashioned, Gothic ring to it that appealed to me. I wasn't disappointed with the novel.

I've read a number of YA supernatural romances over the last few years, which have become popular ever since the Twilight phenomenon exploded. This is one of the better ones I've come across.

Unusually for a YA supernatural romance, the central character is a teenage boy. Theseus Cassius Lowood is descended from a long line of ghost hunters, most recently his father, who died at the hands of a powerful and mysterious spirit in Baton Rouge a decade earlier. After his father's death, Cas inherited a wicked looking mystical knife known as an athame, which his father used to kill ghosts.

Cas would fit brilliantly into the TV show Supernatural; he's cut from the same cloth as the Winchester brothers and moves from town to town, job to job, the same way that they do, killing ghosts in a gung-ho, action packed style.
Everything changes for Cas when he moves to Thunder Bay and comes up against the town legend, a teenage girl who had her throat cut on the way to a high school dance in the 1950s. Ever since, she's literally been tearing her victims apart, her rage is so strong.

But Cas discovers another side to the spirit when she spares his life after he falls victim to a prank. As he discovers more about Anna's past, it becomes obvious that she was the victim of a horrific death, which casts her ghostly murders in a different light.

As such, the novel deals with the idea of good and evil in an accessible way. Anna has committed some horrendous crimes, but she was also the victim of one. Her actions can be explained, but that doesn't excuse her of them.

It seems that a recent trend in supernatural romances is for the male lead, or the love interest, to be a bad boy, with little to redeem him. I find it hard to believe in a romance when one of the characters is completely mean all the time. Here the characters are better drawn and easier to empathise with, which makes the book much more engaging.

The story is fast-moving and exciting, with plenty of brutal and bloody action. There are some genuinely chilling moments and the descriptions of the ghosts have a visceral quality.

I really enjoyed this book and will definitely keep an eye out for the sequel.