Anita Blake is a fictional character in the Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter series of novels by Laurell K. Hamilton. Subsequently, she has also appeared in the Dabel Brothers/Marvel Comics adaptation of her first novel, Guilty Pleasures.

Blake is the heroine of a vampire slayer series written by Laurell K. Hamilton. The series takes place in a parallel fantasy world where vampires, shape shifters, werewolves, faeries, etc. exist. Her night job, and primary source of income, is the legal profession of re-animating the dead. As an "animator" in a parallel St. Louis, her job entails using magical abilities to bring temporary life to dead bodies in order to question them for legal purposes. She is a necromancer, which allows her to control the dead, including vampires and zombies, but not ghosts and ghouls. She is also a licensed vampire hunter/executioner, with eventual empowerment as a Federal Marshal. In her world this profession involves tracking down and killing vampires who have murdered humans. She is also held in retainer for the Regional Preternatural Investigation Team (RPIT, pronounced Rip-it), which investigates supernatural crimes committed involving magic, vampires, werewolves, and other superrnatural creatures.

A strong protagonist in the series, Blake is very direct, rude, and yet highly competent in the professions she is involved in. She is trained in judo, kenpo and knows how to use several weapons, but is most efficient with guns (the Browning Hi-Power being her firearm of choice). She is also a devout Christian which often creates moral dilemmas for the character. She is currently of the Episcopalian faith, having left Catholicism since the Catholic church has excommunicated all animators. She is of mixed heritage: Her mother was Mexican and her father's family was German.

Anita Blake (in the book, Danse Macabre) is a twenty-seven year old resident of St. Louis. Born a necromancer with the power to raise and control zombies as well as power over other forms of undead, Anita leads a complicated life. Her main job is as an animator for "Animators, Inc.", a St. Louis-based business that raises the dead for the right price. Anita is also a licensed vampire executioner, (known to vampires as "The Executioner") a consultant for RPIT, the area's police division in charge of preternatural crimes. She has also been given the status of a federal marshal.

Anita is hardboiled, flippant and stubborn. Like Kinsey Millhone and V.I. Warshawski, she has major emotional issues, is frequently the only female in macho situations, and tends to come across as quite prickly and difficult. Like Spenser and Matthew Scudder, she plays knight errant, championing vulnerable characters who ask for her help. Anita also lacks tact, loses her temper, is insubordinate, and tends to be quite hypocritical in many regards.

In almost every book, a deus ex machina moment occurs and Anita either discovers new abilities, further develops existing abilities, or both. The below summary encompasses all the books; her abilities in early books are much more limited.

• Necromancer: Anita is one of the most powerful animators operating commercially. She can raise zombies, sense the dead, sense vampires and lycanthropes, estimate their power level, and can resist (at least partially) mental influence from vampires. Particulars that set her apart from other animators:
  
• Anita's zombies look lifelike and can fool the untrained eye, including "healing" any sign of decay or injury.
  
• She can raise zombies that are centuries dead, and in later books can do so without human sacrifice.
  
• She is one of the few animators who can act as a "focus" to combine the powers of multiple animators.
  
• In Bloody Bones and The Killing Dance she raises vampires (during daylight) as if they were zombies. According to Jean-Claude, this is a rare ability. After raising a vampire, she can heal any wounds as if it were a zombie.
  
• In book 14 she is able to heal a vampire without raising it first.
  
• Her necromancer abilities refer to the ability to control all types of undead. In Bloody Bones, she controls the vampire she raised during the day; in Blue Moon, she realizes she has some measure of control over Damian.
  
• Anita is also able to call and control the spirits of dead werewolves (munin). She has particular affinity for the spirit of Raina and can channel Raina's healing abilities (Burnt Offerings and later).
  
• Combat training: Anita has a black belt in Judo as of the first book. In Obsidian Butterfly she is also studying Kenpo Karate. She works out regularly with her best friend Ronnie "to be able to out run the bad guys" when she needs to. She credits Edward for much of her training in weapons, primarily handguns and knives.
  
• Detective training: Though she rarely uses these skills in later novels, Anita has been involved with many investigations with RPIT and, in the later books, with the FBI. Her police contact, Rudolph Storr, routinely requires her to engage in independent crime scene reconstruction in order to obtain an analysis -- Anita's reconstructions are almost always correct and frequently include insights that the police have missed. Anita thinks like both a cop and a monster, according to some, which is what makes her so insightful.
  
• As of Cerulean Sins, she has Federal Marshal status which allows her to now enter any preternatural crime scene she so desires, or follow a vampire or other non-human crime suspect across state lines.
  
• Supernatural experience: Anita holds a bachelor's degree in preternatural biology and is a trained vampire executioner. She also has a well-worn two-semester background in comparative religion. These courses often told her useful tidbits about other cultures/mythologies, and throughout the series she learns vastly more about vampires, lycanthropes, and other preternatural creatures. RPIT relies on her for information about a wide variety of supernatural entities.
  
• Human servant: In books 1-3 and 6+, Jean-Claude has marked Anita with three of the four marks necessary to make her his human servant. This grants Anita unusual strength, rapid healing, increased resistance to vampire's abilities, and an almost complete resistance to Jean-Claude's mental influence, as well as a psychic connection to Jean-Claude himself. In books 12+, Anita has given Damian, her vampire servant, the fourth mark. This does not interfere with Jean Claude's marks. It is uncertain if this unconventional fourth mark grants Anita immortality.
  
• Triumvirate member: Anita is a member of a "triumvirate" with Jean-Claude and Richard Zeeman (The Killing Dance). At first the only effect was their powers boosting when they are together, and more so when touching. (The usefulness of the triumvirate varies with the interpersonal conflicts between Richard, Jean-Claude, and Anita.) Some results that developed in Narcissus in Chains and later novels:
  
• Anita, Jean-Claude, and Richard are all telepathically and metaphysically linked. They can speak mind-to-mind, share dreams, and draw on each other's energy and abilities.
  
• Each is becoming more like the other.
  
• Anita has developed several powers similar to those of vampires and lycanthropes.
  
• In Incubus Dreams Anita, Damien and Nathaniel create another triumvirate with Anita as the center.
  
• Vampire powers: The combination of her necromancy and her membership in the triumvirate has caused Anita to develop a series of powers formerly seen only in vampires, including the following.
  
• Anita has the ability to copy vampire powers that are used against her - sometimes temporarily, sometimes permanently (Narcissus in Chains).
  
• Ardeur (Narcissus in Chains) (spelling varies, depending on the book). Anita developed this power after Jean-Claude fed his ardeur through her. The ardeur has proven in later books to manipulate the personalities of Anita and those around her, as well as to be addictive to some characters (such as London). The ardeur seems to be the main source of most of Anita's powers, as new powers arise anytime Anita gives into the arduer.
  
• Power draining: Anita has copied, apparently permanently, Itzpapalotl's ability to drain the life energy from her victims and, if she chooses, to use that energy to heal another (Obsidian Butterfly).
  
• Harm from a distance - the ability to turn a person's aura against them, usually resulting in cuts (Narcissus in Chains). Jean-Claude had studied how this worked but did not have the ability. Anita has the ability, and Jean-Claude used their metaphysical connection to "show" her how to use it. (We also saw this ability used against Anita in The Killing Dance).
  
• Animal to call - leopards (Narcissus in Chains) and lions (Danse Macabre), and tigers ("Blood Noir") possibly others.
  
• Power to bind vampire and animal servants: Anita has the power to bind a vampire servant and an animal servant. She inadvertently used this power to attract a vampire servant, Damian (Blue Moon), and formed a second triumvirate between them and Nathaniel (Incubus Dreams) which presumably has increased her power further.

During a period of hospitalization at the end of the novella Micah, Anita’s blood test revealed that whilst she is not a lycanthrope, she is a carrier of at least four, possibley five, types of the lycanthropy virus: wolf, leopard, lion (as a result of her sexual relationships with various lycanthropes), and two so far unidentified but potentially tiger (this may be as a reaction to the machinations of the Mother of All Darkness), snake (as a result of the by Chimera in his weresnake form), or lamia (as a result of the attack by melaine). This is considered unusual because one type of lycanthropy usually provides immunity to the other forms. This method of thinking, as of The Harlequin, has resulted in the injection of a rare feline lycanthropy to combat a recent infection due to attack. Because the viruses counteract one another this would result in an infection-free blood test. The same may be true for the reptilian strain Anita may have. One exception to the viral immunity/nullification was Chimera, who had multiple forms of lycanthropy and first used the phrase panwere to describe himself (Narcissus in Chains). One Theory about Chimera’s condition is that because he was infected by multiple forms of lycanthropes before his first change, he thus developed the transformative abilities of each virus; this directly contrasts the medical procedure of deliberate infection used in The Harlequin . Another theory, is that Chimera had somehow contracted a mutation (or caused the mutation) of the virus allowing all others to coexist without nullifying one another. Anita may have inheirited this mutation from the Chimera.