City of Bones book review

City of Bones by Cassandra Clare
Series: The Mortal Instruments #1
Published by Margaret K. McElderry Books on March 27, 2007
Pages: 485
Goodreads

When fifteen-year-old Clary Fray heads out to the Pandemonium Club in New York City, she hardly expects to witness a murder― much less a murder committed by three teenagers covered with strange tattoos and brandishing bizarre weapons. Then the body disappears into thin air. It's hard to call the police when the murderers are invisible to everyone else and when there is nothing―not even a smear of blood―to show that a boy has died. Or was he a boy?

This is Clary's first meeting with the Shadowhunters, warriors dedicated to ridding the earth of demons. It's also her first encounter with Jace, a Shadowhunter who looks a little like an angel and acts a lot like a jerk. Within twenty-four hours Clary is pulled into Jace's world with a vengeance when her mother disappears and Clary herself is attacked by a demon. But why would demons be interested in ordinary mundanes like Clary and her mother? And how did Clary suddenly get the Sight? The Shadowhunters would like to know...

City of Bones was a reread for me, I had read the entire series a long time ago and it definitely wasn’t one of my favourites. I think a big part of my hatred for the series was Clary Fray herself. Well fast forward however many years it’s been since City of Heavenly Fire has come out and I decided to give them another read in case I had missed something the first time around. Now don’t get too excited but I did enjoy it more than I remember but I’m not sure I enjoyed it enough to carry on reading the series. The issues that I had with Clary were still there and it made me wonder whether they become more pronounced as the series goes on. I’m glad I reread it, but I think this was enough for me.

I think that City of Bones in particular struggles with really bland characters. They are introduced and you can just feel the stereotypes rolling off them. I don’t mind a book that has maybe one or two tropey characters but this, the entire cast was a trope. I didn’t get a connection with any of them as all the dialogue seemed to be extremely superficial and the relationships themselves were superficial. Clary the main character was problematic in the sense that she treated her friends like absolute crap and thought that her rude behaviour was sassy and hilarious. It wasn’t. I just wanted there to be more about them as people and less trying to rush into a romance that wasn’t developed and seemed to be created for the sake of it.

Anything that had Magnus Bane in it. He was a breath of fresh air in the sense that it was really obvious what he thought about the Shadowhunters and it was nice to see a “normal” person in City of Bones not revere and want to bow at their feet. I know that seems a little weird as the Shadowhunters are hated by most Downworlders and showed open disgust, but it was better done with Magnus, he was classy and also well put together, I just think his lack of like for the Shadowhunters was well done. Enough of my rambling about the wonderful Magnus Bane.

In City of Bones? Anything that involved Jace and Clary, to be honest. They were the worst in terms of “banter” and chemistry. They actually didn’t have anything in common and I think the reason I hated it so much was how engineered the entire thing felt. I wished that it had happened more naturally especially when it came to kisses and the romance element, and the ending was shockingly bad. Maybe now after writing this about my worst bits, I didn’t enjoy it as much as I thought I did. In my defence though is there anything worse than a romance that feels forced and fake?

As I don’t think I’m going to carry on with the series I don’t think it would be fair for me to recommend City of Bones. I think there are much better books such as Strange the Dreamer or The Priory of the Orange Tree out there and I think that this has had way too much time in the spotlight.

Are you a big fan of this series? Let me know what it is I’m missing!