Kisses From Hell Anthology Review

This is a new young adult anthology featuring vampire stories from 5 different authors: Kelley Armstrong, Richelle Mead, Alyson Noel, Kristin Cast and Francesca Lia Block.

Sunshine by Richelle Mead - 8/10 - This short story is set in Richelle's Vampire Academy series and is the story of how Lissa Dragomir's parents met (for non VA fans, Lissa is the best friend of the protagonist). I loved getting to meet these two characters who we've heard very little of and never met (they died a couple of years before we meet Lissa in VA). For those up to date on the VA series, you'll understand why I was so curious to see Eric and Rhea together. It's a really good short story that I loved, a great 'extra' for VA fans, but I would hope that non VA fans would enjoy it as well. Really wished it had been longer!!

Bring Me To Life by Alyson Noel - 5/10 - Danika has travelled to England from the US to go to an exclusive art academy, an escape from her inattentive father, her ex-best friend and ex-boyfriend who hooked up. But what she finds is a mansion more than a little creepy. And no other students around. I kind of liked this story, I liked the start a lot. Danika was likable, and the crazy situation she found herself in was interesting. But I didn't particularly like the outcome. It wasn't a bad story, but it wasn't to my taste.

Above by Kristin Cast - 2/10 - This story was...one of the strangest I've read (or tried to read) in a long while. Above and below don't mix, they hunt and kill each other, and in theory there is a star-crossed love story in here, somewhere. It was twisted, strange and I could barely figure out what was going on.

Hunting Kat by Kelley Armstrong - 8/10 - I loved this short story a lot! It's another short story set in Kelley's YA world, which started with her Darkest Powers trilogy and will continue with her Darkness Rising one next year. Kat was first introduced with a short story in The Eternal Kiss anthology. Kat's stories are (for the moment at least) completely unconnected to the main novels, just in the same world. This short story is set about 6 months after Kat's first short, though you wouldn't have to read it to understand this one. I actually enjoyed this a lot more than Kat's first short, and wished it was a lot longer. Kat is being hunted again, but this time, she's not alone.


Lilith by Francesca Lia Block - 3/10 - bit of an odd story. A boy who spends most of his time living in a fantasy world of his own creation suddenly has the attention of a girl who's far too beautiful to be human. He welcomes her unnaturalness, the chance to be strong, if only he has her by his side he feels he'll be just fine. I didn't like the way things went in this story. Didn't really like anything about the main character and thus didn't care what happened, and what happened all worked out kind of strange.

So I only liked two of the five stories, but those two, Hunting Kat (Kelley Armstrong) and Sunshine (Richelle Mead), made it worth buying for me. I wish they'd been longer, but for short stories they had a lot of detail and depth to them, very enjoyable and great additions to the series/worlds they're set in. Or I think they'd make good introductions to the authors if readers haven't read anything by them yet. Shame about the other three, but anthologies are always hit and miss. Wouldn't be surprised to see others thinking a lot of the stories I didn't enjoy. Overall 6/10