(Why oh why oh why do all these books chop off the characters' heads from the nose up?)
Remember how I was waffling a little on the Mortal Instruments series after Book 2, City of Ashes? I am SO GLAD that I stuck with it through Book 3, City of Glass! This was a big turning point book, where a lot of questions are answered and quite a few things are resolved. On my copy of City of Glass, the subtitle declared it to be "the final book in the Mortal Instruments trilogy." Was there a point when people thought it was the end? Maybe that's why so much is cleared up. I do think I could stop here and be satisfied.
(I'm not stopping here. Already started Book 4, City of Fallen Angels, this morning.)
In City of Glass, Jace, Alec, Max, Isabelle, Simon, Clary, and Luc all travel to Idris, which is the Shadowhunter's city and the titular city. The descriptions made it sound like a combo of D.C. and the Hamptons, but for Shadowhunters. The plan is for the Lightwoods to travel to Idris to meet with a high-power warlock and get something from him to heal Jocelyn, Clary's mom. Clary is, of course, Clary and she is NOT happy about being left behind, so she opens her own portal to Idris and goes... accidentally taking Luc with her, as he grabs onto her hand just before she's swept into the portal. There are a few problems with this. 1) No one can portal into Idris without permission, so Clary and Luc kind of "bounce off" the wards and end up in the middle of the lake. 2) No Downworlders allowed. Like Luc.
While they're all in Idris, Valentine tries to take over the city by force, with his demon army and the mortal instruments. No spoilers, but of course Clary and the gang are called upon to help save the city.
As with other Cassandra Clare books that I've read, I loved the writing. The prose is elegant and also approachable. I like the way the characters speak. I love snark, and Jace and Clary are both full of it, and often at unexpected moments.
I also liked all the positive character development in City of Glass. Clary felt a lot less whiny and emotional in this one. I feel like she found an inner strength, and it really shined. Yes, she made some rash decisions, but then she took ownership of them and worked with the others to remedy the situations. Same with Jace. He is still a teen who doesn't always make the best decisions, but he follows his heart and his passions, and everything he does is out of love or concern for the people he loves. Every time he has to deal with anything involving Valentine, my heart breaks for him. How hard it must be to have a dad who is so hateful, but yet have that innate desire to love and to be loved by him. Simon and Isabelle and Alec all grow and mature a little too, over the course of the novel. Simon has made peace with his vampirism, and has taken on a new maturity. He is still trying to live some semblance of a "normal" life, but he does it more for his mom and sister than for himself, which I think is very loving of him.
And finally, the narration: I loved the narration of City of Glass! Natalie Moore has a great voice. I stayed focused the entire time and never had difficulty hearing or understanding her. I liked that the narration was kept at a pretty even volume and had a good cadence to it. You know how sometimes a narrator sounds just like the main character, even though the character is fictional and there's no way you should know how they would sound? This book is like that. I feel like Natalie sounds just like Clary, even though I have no clue how I know that. It just feels right.
*I received my copy of City of Glass from my public library.
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