The Mortal War is over, and sixteen-year-old Clary Fray is back home in New York, excited about all the possibilities before her. She’s training to become a Shadowhunter and to use her unique power. Her mother is getting married to the love of her life. Downworlders and Shadowhunters are at peace at last. And—most importantly of all—she can finally call Jace her boyfriend.
But nothing comes without a price.
Someone is murdering Shadowhunters, provoking tensions between Downworlders and Shadowhunters that could lead to a second, bloody war. Clary’s best friend, Simon, can’t help her—his mother just found out that he’s a vampire, and now he’s homeless. When Jace begins to pull away from her without explaining why, Clary is forced to delve into the heart of a mystery whose solution reveals her worst nightmare: she herself has set in motion a terrible chain of events that could lead to her losing everything she loves. Even Jace.
The stakes are higher than ever in the #1 New York Times bestselling fourth installment of the Mortal Instruments series.
As the fourth book in the series, I'm going to go straight into the spoiler-filled review, but I'll link my reviews to the previous books down below.
City of Bones
City of Ashes
City of Glass
Spoiler-Filled Review
City of Fallen Angels?
More like City of Fallen Relationships.
Literally every relationship in the book faced some issues.
There was Simon and his girl problems. Since the first book his character has changed so much. He's no longer the dorky adorable boy, now he's the hot guy that gets all the girls. Of course I'm happy for him, but I do miss the dorky mundane. In terms of his relationship, I ship him more with Isabelle than with Maia, partly because Maia has another potential love interest and partly because Simon and Izzy are so cute. Sizzy for the win! I just want more of them, hopefully I get that in the next few books.
Then we got Malec. At the beginning of the book, they were traveling across the world, which was really cute. But once they got called back, Magnus had to deal with Camille, who was once his lover, causing a bit of jealousy in Alec, slightly overdramatic but cute nonetheless. I love that they start getting more serious in this book and really start thinking about long term plans. Alec realizes that while Magnus is immortal, he is not. There was talk of immortality for Alec and I'm really wondering if that's going to pan through.
New relationship: Jordan and Maia. Jaia? Mordan? I don't really know. I figured something was off when Kyle joined the band, but I assumed he was an evil spy or something, not a good guy. Thankfull he turned out to be a good guy, and I see a potential relationship between him and Maia. They have history and they know each so I really want them back together.
Finally there was Clace. I am so incredibly disappointed with the lack of cute Clace and am so done with the dramatic Clace. I'm really starting to like Clary more and more. She's grown so much from the first book and she's becoming a more sensible protagonist. Jace, on the other hand, is going downhill. I thought finally being with Clary would bring him back to his usual witty and sarcastic self, but no, of course he has to avoid her for a good part of the book. I get it. He was being tortured in his dreams, but there's this thing called communication. If he had talked to her sooner, they could have found a cure or performed the ritual sooner and prevented a lot of bad things from happening. I really expect some better Clace in the next book.
Overall, I thought the plot was fantastic. I wasn't sure where this book was gonna go after
City of Glass but I like where this is headed. The minor characters were much more involved with the plot and the rescue mission which was great because we got to see more of them and learn more about them.
The plot starts with Shadowhunters found dead scattered throughout the city. These deaths coincide with Camille's appearance, so of course she's suspected. She approaches Simon, giving him an opportunity to become powerful, and Simon, being as awesome as he is, refuses and bands together the Shadowhunters to capture her. During her confession, she disclosed that someone else was ordering her to do all of them, but refuse to say who.
Somewhat separately, there was the issue of the babies. A dead baby was found. A completely normal dead baby except that where his fingers should have been, there were claws.
Jace was also heavily involved in the plot. When Clary brought him back from the dead in
City of Glass, he imbalanced nature. He began having these really strange dreams about killing Clary, and then he had one about Max, who drew a rune on him to bind him to Lilith, the mother of all demons. Who, coincidentally, was in charge of the demon babies and Camille.
In the church where all of them were, there was a huge coffin that had, surprise surprise, Sebastian's body. I figured that Sebastian still alive for two reasons:
1. Sebastian's body was never found
2. The plot had to go somewhere, and it seemed pointless to create a whole new enemy that had little to no connection to the previous books
Bro tip 101: Never proclaim someone dead unless you have their body to prove it.
Once Jace was back to normal and Simon had killed Lilith with the Mark of Cain, (I still don't understand why it's a curse for him? Maybe because it's heavenly and he's "damned"?) I expected everything to calm down, but instead Jace and Sebastian step into the circle and exchange blood and get bound together. Seriously? Clary needs to put Jace on a leash or sumthin' cause this kid is always getting in trouble.
I predict more Clace disturbance. Jace is going to be possessed and bound to Sebastian and hurt Clary or avoid her some more. I'm really hoping they unbind Jace and Sebastian, otherwise that's gonna be a problem.
I finally get why people read the Infernal Devices in conjunction with the Mortal Instruments Series. There are crossover places and characters that appear in both books and it's really fun to catch. For example Will Herondale was mentioned a couple times and Camille De Court made a guest appearance.
Let me know in the comments who you ship. I ship Sizzy hard.
