Kendare Blake

Girl Of Nightmares by Kendare Blake

TITLE: Girl Of Nightmares
SERIES: Anna #2
AUTHOR: Kendare Blake
PUBLICATION DATE: A, 2012
PUBLISHER: Tor Teen
PAGES: 239 pages
FORMAT: Hardback
SOURCE: Gift
RATING: 4 stars

Let me just go ahead and apologize now because I know this review is going to come out weird…and probably shorter than I usually write. I don’t know what’s up with me lately, just not in a reviewing mood I guess.

Girl of Nightmares picks up six months after the events of Anna Dressed In Blood. Cas can’t seem to let Anna go and then she starts showing up and haunting him. He has to watch as she is tortured and there isn’t anything he can do about it. For a while he thinks he is going insane because he knows Anna is on the otherside, wherever that may be, and she can’t possibly be back in his world. But the athame doesn’t lie and when it detects her as well, Cas becomes determined to find Anna and bring her back from her torturous afterlife. One that she is only in because she saved Cas, Thomas, and Carmel from the Obeahman.

When I finished Girl Of Nightmares last year, I was so epically angry that I couldn’t put it into words. The novel was perfect but the ending had me screaming at the top of my lungs. Stupid goddamn cliffhanger, why why why?!?!? So, as you can imagine, I was eager to get my hands on the sequel. My feelings upon finishing it, are an extremely watered down version of what I felt when I finished ADIB. I’m not angry, per se, just disappointed. The novel was great, Cas is a believable teenage boy and I think we all know how difficult it is to find a novel by a woman that really feels like a guy, the story is as interesting and intense as ADIB, but the ending just left something to be desired. I felt like Cas still got the short end of the stick. I knew enough to know that Kendare Blake wasn’t the type of author to just wave a magic wand and have Cas bring Anna back over, she magically turns human again and they skip off into the sunset, I knew that wasn’t going to happen, so I don’t know exactly what I was expecting, but it definitely wasn’t that.

All that being said, it was still a great book. I really enjoyed it and though I wasn’t satisfied with the ending, it definitely fit the storyline. If you enjoyed ADIB, you’ll definitely enjoy this one, just be prepared for the ending.