City of Glass by Cassandra Clare

Disclaimer: I get all my books from the library.
 
Today's book is City of Glass by Cassandra Clare, the last in her three book series. IF YOU HAVEN'T READ THE FIRST TWO, THIS REVIEW WILL GIVE YOU SPOILERS.

Clary finally gets to the capital city, the secret home of her people. But things aren't right. Her brother (and would-be lover), Jace, acts strange around her and tries to keep her from staying. Her vampire friend Simon is in prison, and it looks like there might be more than one corrupt person in the city council.

But that's not the worst of it. Demons break down the barriers protecting the city, and the Shadow Guardians are thrown into a war where they must unite with the werewolves, faeries, and vampires if they think they'll have a chance to overthrow Valentine.

I could hardly put this book down. It was very good and had me riveted. And yet a part of that was because I kept waiting for something to resolve itself between Jace and Clary. It finally did...and was very anticlimactic. After all the tension, the passion that was built between them over the whole trilogy, I felt let down in the end. That was my only complaint about the book.

I give this book a B.

A = Buy this book NOW
B = Buy this when you can
C = Check it out from the library
D = Don't bother reading it
F = Burn it

City of Ashes by Cassandra Clare

Disclaimer: I get all my books from the library.

Today's book is City of Ashes by Cassandra Clare.

Warning: SPOILERS if you haven't read book 1!

Picking up right where City of Bones left off, City of Ashes continues with an action-packed adventure as Jace tries to prove his innocence. The forbidden love between Jace and his sister Clary is HOT, and even those of us who are absolutely not in favor of incense (like myself) find ourselves rooting for them to break all laws and be together.

Simon got on my nerves in this one--a little too much of Jacob from New Moon.

This book was even better than the first. It had me riveted. We see more of the werewolves and vampires and get to meet the fairies. But most importantly, we find out there is something special ability that Jace and Clary have--something that they gained through their common blood.

I give this book an B+.

A = Buy this book NOW
B = Buy this when you can
C = Check it out from the library
D = Don't bother reading it
F = Burn it

City of Bones by Cassandra Clare

Disclaimer: I get all my books from the library. 

Today's book is City of Bones, by Cassandra Clare.

Clary thinks she is an ordinary girl until one night she witnesses a murder. The next thing she knows, her mother has been kidnapped, her adopted 'father' tells her never to speak to him again, and her house destroyed. The group of people who take her in to protect her are the very ones who did the murdering.

And it gets worse. Clary finds out that she isn't ordinary after all. She is gifted, like those protecting her, with the power to fight demons.

With that gift, any pretense at normality is destroyed.

This is an excellent book. Clare pulled me, had me rooting for certain characters, and definitely swayed any conventional views by throwing a horrible twist into the love story. She took some liberties with the POV, which I found unnecessary: almost the entire book was told from Clary's POV, but we had about two pages (one page each) told from someone else's POV, one being a person who died two seconds later. Obviously, she's a bestseller and published books afterwards, so she's allowed to get away with it. Still, it felt contrived to me.

Secondly, she's huge on description. Great for world-building, but a bit boring. No problems. I skipped most of it, jumping to the next strand of dialogue, and read the book faster than most.

I give this book an B.

A = Buy this book NOW
B = Buy this when you can
C = Check it out from the library
D = Don't bother reading it
F = Burn it