Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Review: City of Glass by Cassandra Clare (Mortal Instruments #3)

City of Glass (The Mortal Instruments, #3)

THE DETAILS:
Pages: 492
Genre: Young Adult Fiction, Fantasy
Release Date: 2009
Publisher: Walker Books
Won in an online Giveaway.

THE BLURB:
Amid the chaos of war, the Shadowhunters must to decide to fight with the vampires, werewolves and other Downworlders - or against them. Meanwhile, Jace and Clary have their own decision to make should they pursue the love they know is forbidden?

THE REVIEW:
'City of Glass' was definitely not what I expected. Despite the raving reviews of others I have so far found this series to be a bit slow-moving and I hadn't quite gotten onto the 'Mortal Instruments' band-wagon like everyone else has and started drooling over characters or caring that much about the casting for the 'City of Bones' movie. While 'City of Glass' was still a slow read, I now feel that there is something to be excited about with this series.

I was a bit iffy about this series after the first two books. In my review of 'City of Bones' I talk about my reluctance to start the series, but this is something else entirely. 'Mortal Instruments' is a series that everyone absolutely raves about and while I did enjoy the first two novels and give them high ratings I just couldn't get excited about them. I could see the potential in Clare's writing, but I didn't understand how this series had become such a big thing. This book changed that for me. I now feel emotionally invested in these characters and am dying to know what will happen next (And, I will have to die for a short time and read some of the books in my overgrown TBR).

One of the things I really liked about this book was the character development. It was nice to see more of some of the minor characters and meet some new ones. I think one of the bigger problems with my lack of interest in the series was my lack of connection with the characters. Isabelle, Alec and Clary all seemed quite 2D to me in the first two books, because I felt like I didn't really know them. Clary was a bit of a tom-boy, she liked to draw, she's in love with Jace and she has red-hair. Whoop-de-do. Oh, that and, she likes comic books. That's pretty vague. And, even emotionally or intellectually I felt like I didn't understand her. Sometimes she could understand things that were really hard to understand and sometimes she could be so daft. I'm still not Clary's biggest fan, but I feel like I understand her a little better after this book. She makes a little more sense.

I actually felt really bad for Clary in this novel. Even though she may have acted foolishly at times I didn't agree with the way that people were treating her like a child. Jace comes up with a reason for his attraction to Clary and makes her feel wrong almost, for having those feelings towards him without an excuse.

I think my favourite character so far would have to be Magnus Bane. He reminds me a lot of Damon Salvatore from the 'Vampire Diaries' TV Show in a way. Both characters are immortal, hilariously pompous and keep the truth from people they like in order to get what they want as well as getting the person in question to do what they should be doing to save the day. Obviously Magnus doesn't have the same charm as Damon (I think part of that is because he's gay, And if being fictional weren't a big enough problem to keep us apart, homosexuality definitely is ), but I think I like him more for that. It's good to read a book with interesting characters, where the interest isn't a result of their sexual attractiveness.

The relationship between Magnus and Alec is surprisingly heart-wrenching. I don't know if I've read a book with a gay couple in it before (If I had it mustn't have been very memorable), but I thought it was really cool that the author included a same-sex couple in the story because there are a lot of great series out there that don't have a hint of homo-sexuality in them, which doesn't seem realistic or fair.

The only problem I had with this story (apart from how slow it is to read) was how long the epilogue dragged on for. Everything had already happened and in reading this I felt like the author had no idea how to finish the story. I ended up skimming over most of it and thought that some of it was a little too cheesy (or maybe that's just me).

Overall, 5/5stars and a favourite! I really liked 'City of Glass' and even though there were still a few faults I thought I just had to Favourite it, because finally I actually care about the story and it's the sort of book that I definitely wouldn't mind reading again.

REVIEWS:
1. 'City of Bones'
2. 'City of Ashes'

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Natalie

1 comment:

Katja Weinert said...

I should really read those instructions on borrowing and lending via kindle! I keep meaning to.