Saturday, May 24, 2014

Review: City of Fallen Angels (The Mortal Instruments #4) by Cassandra Clare

City of Fallen Angels (The Mortal Instruments #4) by Cassandra Clare
Paperback; 424 pages
Published by Margaret K. McElderry on October 2, 2012 (first published on April 5, 2011)
Rating: 3 stars

Summary (Goodreads): 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.

My Thoughts: 
I honestly went back and forth with this book. I both enjoyed it and didn't enjoy it. 

In the beginning, the story started out strong and held my interest rather well. As the story progressed however, it slowly started to disappoint me. I just wasn't interested in the direction Clare wanted to bring this story. I believe the decline really started to show around the halfway point of the book.

With the different perspectives of each of the characters, there was able to be several different stories that were all connected but also separate. I enjoyed this, because when I wasn't enjoying a perspective of one of the characters, I knew that soon enough I would be back with another.

When the book starts out, I enjoyed everyone's perspective. I didn't care much for one thing Simon was doing that Clary knew about, but that's not something that would make me dislike the story or anything at all. I was surprised at how much I enjoyed reading about Simon and his life now as a vampire, even though he was trying to be as normal as possible. I also really enjoyed reading from Clary's perspective and seeing her training, as she is now going to be a shadowhunter. Jace's perspective was interesting as well, as he has issues he is personally dealing with that revolve around his family.

Then comes his dreams.

I didn't like this part of the book at all. It made me kind of sad, because I really like reading about Clary and Jace, but in this book I found myself dreading their sections in the book. I just didn't like the plot that Clare was making between them, and I didn't like how Jace didn't want to tell Clary what was wrong. That's literally the worst thing you can do, not tell someone what is wrong when there is something going on, and then start to completely ignore and avoid them. It just really annoyed me.

I will say this though, while it did annoy me when it came to Jace's actions, I did enjoy having him around when I was reading about Simon. When the story wasn't filled with Jace's angsty problems, I found myself liking what I was reading. Even when things like Jace's appearance were brought into play and the issues that came from that, when it wasn't from his perspective I didn't mind it much.

Simon really was the only person that kept me happy with this novel. His storyline was more captivating to me since he was learning more about the consequences of being a vampire, and he also was learning the consequences about the mark of Cain that Clary placed on him. The mark was really interesting to me, and while it was awful how it worked, I also found myself fascinated with it. 

Really I don't know what direction I should take this review in. By the end of the book, I felt like I was going to be happy with the turn of events, as it began to go in a direction I liked, but then, in the final pages, that was squashed. I don't like the way the series seems to be going, but we'll have to see. My close friend told me she loved the fifth book, so I'm hoping I do as well. I also don't want people to think I disliked this book, I did enjoy the read at some points, but I didn't like not being happy with the turn of events the way I was. Either way, Simon was the saving grace of this novel and I hope to see more of him in the next book!


★★★

4 comments:

  1. I felt pretty much the same way when reading this. For the last two books in this series, this and City of Lost Souls, I think Simon pretty much leads the entire story line.

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    1. I'm hoping I like the next one a little bit more than this one, and I'm glad Simon will still be a leading person in the story, though I wish the others still interested me as much as he does.

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  2. I've only read up to the second book in this series, but I hope to re read those first two books and finish up the series soon. But I've seen a lot of reviews like yours where people like and dislike it. The series was originally suppose to only be a trilogy, so that has me a bit worried.

    Lisa
    www.turningpages94.blogspot.com

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    1. Yeah, I think it would have probably been better off just as a trilogy. I loved the first three books, and while I wanted more, I don't really care for the direction of this one. I'll definitely still read the rest, but I don't think I'll like them nearly as much as the first three. I hope you enjoy them when you get to them!

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