Girl of Nightmares (Anna #2)by Kendare Blake
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I am coming back, is what I was going to say. But this isn’t a game, and that isn’t a promise I should make.
Wow. Kendare Blake has earned my respect in the span of a two book series-not an easy thing to do. What started out as a simple Halloween buddy read became an obsessive impulse to read two books in 3 days. It’s not always about how well known a book is-it’s about how the book is written. What appeals to your taste, your style, your mood, and ultimately what makes you happy.
And these books made me so sooo happy.
It would still be years before I’d go up against ghosts of any real strength-ghosts like Anna Korlov, the girl who could have torn out my spine anytime she liked, but wound up saving me instead.
A beautiful fantasy created to both appeal to your imagination and tug on your heartstrings, Blake succeeded by invading my mind and clouding my vision-this series was all I cared about and all I could see. I would be typing invoices at work, but I wasn’t really typing invoices at work. All I could see was Cas-Cas fighting ghosts, Cas pining after Anna, Anna fighting for their love just as strongly as Cas was, Cas’s broken whispers for Anna…it was unbelievable how strongly I fell in love with these characters.
This must be how a caught fish feels, pulled up onto a dock, the wood pressing into its gills and eye when nothing has ever pressed against it before. Their gills throb to no use. My lungs pull no use. Something is moving in and out of them, but it isn’t air. There’s no sensation of nourishment hitting my blood. I grab my chest.
A world where a boy falls in love with the girl he can never have, where the girl is no longer alive, but in a limbo between death and wherever these tortured souls are supposed to go-A world he must save her from….but where will she choose to go? Will she stay with him, or will she choose to move on…?
She crossed over death to find me. I crossed through Hell to find her.
I can’t even begin to tell you how refreshing it is to read a book that isn’t on everyone’s radar at this very moment-to not know the outcome, to not know whether people are upset about an ending or not. GON isn’t in the limelight, and it was like my own personal, secret treasure that made adrenaline course through my veins and my heart thump with the anticipation of just
not knowing
what will happen mixed with giddy nerves. Blake’s writing is amazing to me, still. I could literally taste the blood in my throat, I could feel what each individual character felt, every movement and every feeling-it was both exhilarating and rejuvenating.
This place is the thing behind madness. There is nothing good here. Off the map. If you eat frustration it chokes you. This place exists in the wake of a scream.
Had the ending not been so abrupt, this most likely would have been a 5 star read. The depth with which Blake embedded this story into my brain couldn’t be compromised, but I still wish there would have been more of a closing, an epilogue, a future glimpse-something. The quick ending was my only gripe with the story, and it stayed with me until even this morning, so I decided half a star deduction was adequate-I wasn’t disappointed by any means, just a little deflated with the lack of a glimpse into the future. Just a personal preference on my part, and not everyone will feel the same.
He doesn’t want Anna anymore. He has her. I’m the last loose end.
An absolutely amazing and imaginitive series, I was enthralled from page one as Cas tried to take out the route 12 hiker. I enjoyed being inside his snarky mind and hearing his inner dialogue and I’m going to miss him dearly. I’ve only known him for a short time, but it was a wonderful adventure and I have placed these books oh-so-dearly on my favorites shelf-and they will remain there forever.
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