(I received a free copy of this book in exchange for a review).
(This review may contain spoilers).
I did find myself drawn by the blurb of this book. I was intrigued by the plot of this and was very interested in reading it.
Unfortunately, I didn’t feel the book quite met my expectations. Although there were some good elements of mystery in this, I felt that there wasn’t much in the way of twists. To me, it was fairly obvious where the story was heading. Although the journey to get there was fairly interesting, I was quite disappointed that there wasn’t more suspense in the book.
I got the feeling that this book was meant to be a mix of genres – romance, paranormal, mystery, young adult. While there are times this can be pulled off well, I was left with a lot of unanswered questions by the end of this book.
I did like the fact that this book was written entirely from the perspective of one character. While I did find Leo an interesting character, I didn’t feel she had any goals past the story. I could understand her weaknesses, though… but a lot of the backstory was given in the narration, rather than allowing me to see the events happening. I didn’t like Henry’s character and I couldn’t understand why Leo remained friends with him after how she was clearly viewing him.
I liked the elements of friendship in this book. I would have liked to see more of Leo interacting with the other characters and more of her friendship with others apart from Henry.
I did like the legend about the mansion, though I thought it felt rather unfinished. The paranormal aspects were pretty cool, but I didn’t think they added a whole lot to the book. I wasn’t really sold on the romance, though, I have to say. I didn’t really like Becket’s character and I especially didn’t like the hints of a love triangle… that didn’t really feel realistic.
While it might be interesting to see more of these characters, I don’t think I’d read a sequel to this book… at least not the way it stands right now.
Ink of Blood 