Review: The Coldest Girl in Coldtown by Holly Black

Title: The Coldest Girl in Coldtown
Author: Holly Black 
Publisher: Little Brown Books for Young Readers

Publication date: September 3, 2013

Genre(s): Young Adult (Paranormal/Vampires)

Source: Publisher 

Format: ARC

Pages: 432

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Tana lives in a world where walled cities called Coldtowns exist. In them, quarantined monsters and humans mingle in a decadently bloody mix of predator and prey. The only problem is, once you pass through Coldtown’s gates, you can never leave.

One morning, after a perfectly ordinary party, Tana wakes up surrounded by corpses. The only other survivors of this massacre are her exasperatingly endearing ex-boyfriend, infected and on the edge, and a mysterious boy burdened with a terrible secret. Shaken and determined, Tana enters a race against the clock to save the three of them the only way she knows how: by going straight to the wicked, opulent heart of Coldtown itself.

Before starting this, I actually read a few bad reviews of it and was pretty disappointed. Thank God, it was actually a pretty good book! Not that great, but it was enjoyable! In Tana's world, towns that are called Coldtowns exist. Coldtowns are towns where vampires live along with some humans. After a party, Tana wakes up unconscious in the middle of the bathroom. There, she finds that every person at that party was actually dead, killed by vampires. There, she finds her ex-boyfriend tied to a bed, along with a vampire who is tied to a chair. I absolutely loved how this book started hard-core. There was no need for introductions, and the action happened as soon as we opened the first chapter. There was no slow paced beginnings, and we got right into the bloody fights. It was delicious.. haha.

Tana was a great character to read about. You might think she's fierce and all, but she's mostly adventurous. It's like she is attracted to trouble, and always wants to find out more. She's kinda like me in a way. Tana's ex-boyfriend Adrian was such an amazing character as well. I think his presence was really big, even if he wasn't one to talk that much. Also, Gavriel was just the perfect addition to the mix. Gavriel was the unknown, dangerous vampire who went along them in their journey. The world building was great as well! The Coldtowns were described as trashy places that were destroyed with no room for hope. It really felt like the destructed part of the world. I don't think I had any problems with characters or world building or writing style, but maybe the pace of the book towards the middle. I think things kind of paused there, and not much really happened. Though I was glad things picked up quickly after that.

Overall, The Coldest Girl in Coldtown was a great book! It had it's own twist on vampires, and it was entertaining to read Holly Black's version of vampires. It was a really big book, but nothing was really unnecessary! I will definitely be picking up Holly Black's other books as this was my first one ever. I would really recommend this book to vampire lovers who aren't sick of vampires just because of Twilight!