I was not expecting great things from "Anna Dressed in Blood." I expected another goopy teen paranormal romance, and not much more. But I received a pleasant surprise in Kendare Blake's debut novel, a genuinely thrilling horror story with a well-rounded cast, a creeping sense of horror, and a powerful writing style soaked in blood and grave dirt. 
 Years ago, Cas Lowood's father hunted and "killed" ghosts with a magical athame, until one of the ghosts left him dead. And partly eaten. Now Cas and his mother travel around, continuing his father's work. 
 A tip leads them to Thunder Bay, Ontario, where the ghost called "Anna Dressed in Blood" tears apart anyone who comes into her decrepit house. But for some reason, she doesn't hurt Cas -- and he soon realizes that Anna doesn't want to kill. She's possessed by some dark force that makes her rip her victims apart and hoard their bodies, but she refuses to tell Cas what it is. 
 So Cas sets out with his new friends, nerdy psychic Thomas and queen bee Carmel, to discover what trapped Anna in this house as a monstrous killing machine. But their attempts go awry when someone steals Cas's athame, and an evil far older and more horrifying returns to kill them... 
 "Anna Dressed in Blood" honestly reminds me of Jim Butcher -- pop culture references (mostly "Ghostbusters"), an impossible romantic attachment, and a hard-headed soft-hearted hero who frequently gets beaten to a jelly in the course of duty. In short, Kendare Blake writes sort of like Butcher, if Butcher wrote for a teen audience. 
 Blake has a brisk, slightly wry style that occasionally erupts with gruesome visions (the "braid" of dismembered, rotting bodies) and vivid magical battles. And she doesn't hold back on the gruesome stuff -- one of the early chapters has a boy literally ripped in half. And the scene of Anna's death is downright painful to read about, with hate, blood, loathing and desperation all wrapped up in one. 
 Downsides? I would have liked to have known why Anna's killer murdered her, since that person seemed to be acting with motiveless hatred. 
 And the cast has a lot of well-rounded, non-cliche characters -- the flaky Wiccan mom is very sweet and down-to-earth, and the blonde popular queen bee is actually brave, smart and kind. And Blake paints particularly vivid characterizations of Cas and Anna, two teens whose lives were cut short by death -- her by her murder, and he by taking up his dad's mantle. 
 Hopefully Kendare Blake has more adventures for Cassio Theseus Lowood, because "Anna Dressed in Blood" left me hungry for much, much more. Bring on the wendigo!