Blood Magic Review

Title: Blood Magic (The Blood Journals #1)

Author: Tessa Gratton

Publication Date: May 24, 2011

Published By: Random House 

Format: ARC, 405 pages

Summary

This page-turning debut novel will entice fans who like their paranormal romances dark and disturbing. It's a natural next-read for fans of Stephanie Meyer, Carrie Jones, and Becca Fitzpatrick. But instead of mythical creatures, blood magic has everything to do with primal human desires like power, wealth, and immortality. 

Everywhere Silla Kennicott turns she sees blood. She can't stop thinking about her parents alleged murder-suicide. She is consumed by a book filled with spells that arrives mysteriously in the mail. The spells share one common ingredient: blood, and Silla is more than willing to cast a few. What's a little spilled blood if she can uncover the truth? And then there's Nick—the new guy at school who makes her pulse race. He has a few secrets of his own and is all too familiar with the lure of blood magic. Drawn together by a combination of fate and chemistry, Silla and Nick must find out who else in their small Missouri town knows their secret and will do anything to take the book and magic from Silla.

My Thoughts

What a great story. I didn't find myself flying through pages in outright excitement nor did I laze through them in disinterest. I read through this book at a leisurely pace, because it was such a satisfying book to read. I didn't want to get to the end. 

The plot unwound at a steady pace, letting you in on the secrets bit by bit. All the characters lives have intertwined with each other over such a long period of time causing a tangled mess of lies, love and deceit, you can't help getting lost in it and dying to know how it all unfolds. One of my favorite things is how Josephine's diary entries let you in on her secrets from the past so you could apply the knowledge to what you know of Silla and Nick's present. And the magic was just plain old awesome.

There are few books where I actually enjoy multiple POV's but in Blood Magic it definitely works to it's advantage. There are just so many things that wouldn't have made sense if you were reading from Silla's the entire time. I really liked Silla though, she's resilient and a little strange. The way she wears metaphorical theater masks when she wants to slip into the emotion she thinks will help her best deal with a situation was pretty cool. Nick is just adorable, he's from Chicago and gets moved to this tiny little hick town. He's out of his element and has a dry sense of humor, you really can't help but love him. I really enjoyed everyone in this book for their own reasons. I couldn't even hate Josephine, she's a crazy "witch" but she has her reasons.

The very best part...this book is part of a series so I know I'll get to read more, and I can't friggin wait. Blood Magic gets a huge, enthusiastic 5 out of 5!!

* I won this book in a giveaway on the authors blog. Thank you Tessa :)