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A review by worldsunlikeourown
Blood Countess by Lana Popović
3.0
Read more reviews on my blog at Worlds Unlike Our Own.
Well, this was an interesting read, and I enjoyed it far more than I expected for a book in a genre I have never touched before, and it was surprisingly violent for a YA title. This was my first time reading a book by this author, and also my first book about Countess Elizabeth Bathory, though I am somewhat familiar with what history says about her.
However, Blood Countess turned out to be only an 'okay' read for me overall. In terms of setting and atmosphere, this book did a great job and everything felt very authentic and time period appropriate. The Countess' portrayal was appropriately horrifying, pretty much exactly what I was expecting as was her masterful psychological manipulations of Anna. Anna's willful blindness on the other hand, becomes extremely annoying very quickly, especially since she started off as such a strong and independent personality and then seems to do a 180 into an unbelievably meek version of herself, knowingly allowing herself to be manipulated and swayed into doing horrible things that she would've never dreamed of, never mind that it was the lesser of two evils. It takes her entirely too long to break away.
Another thing I did not enjoy was the pacing. The initial three quarters of the book gets progressively slower and the story seemed to be going nowhere and then suddenly things just pick up and the book is over. That and the ending was not nearly as exciting as I thought it might turn out to be. There was a feeling throughout of something big about to occur that never ended up happening.
Blood Countess was certainly an intriguing read, even if it did have its downsides, and I’m looking forward to seeing what is next in this series.
Well, this was an interesting read, and I enjoyed it far more than I expected for a book in a genre I have never touched before, and it was surprisingly violent for a YA title. This was my first time reading a book by this author, and also my first book about Countess Elizabeth Bathory, though I am somewhat familiar with what history says about her.
However, Blood Countess turned out to be only an 'okay' read for me overall. In terms of setting and atmosphere, this book did a great job and everything felt very authentic and time period appropriate. The Countess' portrayal was appropriately horrifying, pretty much exactly what I was expecting as was her masterful psychological manipulations of Anna. Anna's willful blindness on the other hand, becomes extremely annoying very quickly, especially since she started off as such a strong and independent personality and then seems to do a 180 into an unbelievably meek version of herself, knowingly allowing herself to be manipulated and swayed into doing horrible things that she would've never dreamed of, never mind that it was the lesser of two evils. It takes her entirely too long to break away.
Another thing I did not enjoy was the pacing. The initial three quarters of the book gets progressively slower and the story seemed to be going nowhere and then suddenly things just pick up and the book is over. That and the ending was not nearly as exciting as I thought it might turn out to be. There was a feeling throughout of something big about to occur that never ended up happening.
Blood Countess was certainly an intriguing read, even if it did have its downsides, and I’m looking forward to seeing what is next in this series.