Thursday, July 5, 2012

City of Fallen Angels - Cassandra Clare


CITY OF FALLEN ANGELS

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. Everywhere he turns, someone wants him on their side—along with the power of the curse that's wrecking his life. And they're willing to do anything to get what they want. Not to mention that he's dating two beautiful, dangerous girls—neither of whom knows about the other one.
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.
Love. Blood. Betrayal. Revenge. The stakes are higher than ever in City of Fallen Angels.

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6752378-city-of-fallen-angels



First, I’d like to thank everyone who participated in Mundie Source’s Twitter party last night. We didn’t have enough people to trend #COFA, but we had fun! There were some prizes (including a signed copy of CoFA, which was harder to give away than I thought it’d be!) and some post cards. But there’s more to come, so stay tuned for that!
Second, here’s a quick review for anyone who hasn’t started or finished the book yet: OH. MY. GOD.
And now, if you click below, it will take you to my spoilery review ofCity of Fallen Angels. I invite everyone who has finished the book to comment with your thoughts. Start a discussion! Let’s let it all out, shall we?
If you haven’t finished, don’t fret! You’ve got time. I’m just crazy. Any spoilers will remain solely in this thread. I won’t be updating the site with them or posting about them on Twitter for at least a month. Though you really should get reading, since I’ll also be posting an interview with Cassie about CoFA sometime in the near future!
I’d mostly like to start out by saying “What. On. Earth. Just. Happened!?”
I’ve been nervous about CoFA the same way I was nervous about Clockwork Angel. I kept thinking “But what if things have changed too much?” in CoFA the same way I wondered “But what if I don’t like the characters as much?” about CA. The cold truth of the matter was that I loved City of Glass so much, it was really hard for me to think that it was going to continue when I’d been so content with the end of Glass.
Yeah, I was wrong. I didn’t realize how much more I wanted from the first cycle of TMI until it was given to me.
And now I want more.
I can’t tell you how crazy I must’ve looked to my cats last night. I downloaded the eBook at exactly midnight. Then I read the first chapter on BlogTV, which was fun, but it drastically slowed down my reading process. It takes longer to read out loud than in my head, the same way it takes longer to type than to think about what words I want to put down. So when I ended on BlogTV, I knew I had a lot of work to do if I wanted to be finished by morning.
First, I was fascinated by the spontaneous combustion that anyone who tried to hurt Simon faced. This was so cool to me. I just wanted people to keep trying to kill him, just so I could read the new descriptions about how they were basically obliterated into salt crystals for trying to poke him. I was also fascinated that little Simon Lewis, who we all can remember as that dorky kid in CoB, was now hot and desirable to two equally hot teenage girls. And he had the nerve to play them! Sarah Rees Brennan must’ve been seething over that one. So of course they had to find out that they were being played, leaving Simon alone.
It really was City of Simon for a while, and I didn’t mind at all. Simon was refreshing and it was fascinating to get a glimpse into his strange vampire powers and also how reluctant he is to accept any of them into his life. Because he can walk in daylight, he continues to try and live the life of a normal teenager. But he knows he’s basically biding his time. As Magnus said, they’ll be the only ones left.
Speaking of Magnus: Who else loved jealous!Alec. Any scene where Alec was with Camille just made me feel tense and nervous, like something big was going to happen. When Alec found her at the end (and set her free, that lovesick dope), I was horrified that something bad was going to happen. I’m still not sure about Camille. She makes me nervous. But I do like the idea that there could be a way for Alec and Magnus to not lose each other. Then again, I’ve got this sinking fear that Alec is going to find a way to become immortal with Camille’s help and Magnus is going to find a way to become mortal and it’s just going to be awful, like the ending of City of Angels. I hope I didn’t just give Cassie terrible, torturous ideas.
Other things I loved: Jace’s humor, Camille’s voice, Simon trying not to stare at Alec and Magnus while they made out, Isabelle admitting that she has commitment issues, and Simon’s band, as always (If you’ve read this far: Leave a crazy name for Simon’s band in your comment and I’ll pick one at random next Tuesday for a fun prize).
Things that made me go o.0: Dead babies. Jonathan. Jace cutting Clary. Clary cutting Jace. I was on the train when I read about the dead babies, and I literally had my hand over my mouth because I was so shocked. The same thing goes for the ritual to bring Sebastian/Jonathan back to life, because I was so terrified that Cassie might actually kill Simon again. (As I said on BlogTV: Rule number one of writing is “Kill your babies” and we all know how much Cassie loves Simon!) And then the very end–when J/S actually comes back and that whole bit with Jace… I just don’t know how to handle that. There’s too long of a gap between now and the next book. I was literally shaking at that point. I don’t even want to know what the guy sitting next to me on the train must’ve been thinking.
And that thing with Jace and Clary and the cutting and the blank eyes and the pain…. I just kept thinking “Oh no. Oh no. Oh no. Oh no.” It was worse than when I thought Alec was going to die in CoG, and I didn’t think anything was more torturous than that.
I was wrong. The wait for City of Lost Souls is going to be more torturous. But at least we get Clockwork Prince in the middle to keep us warm and teary while we wait. And I’ll probably update this sporadically and chat below about things I think of after I hit the “publish” button because my mind is just such a mix of jumbled emotions.
What did you think? What were your favorite parts? Where could you feel your heart cracking into a thousand pieces? What did Camille mean when she was “bargaining” with Alec? Who else is going to go out and get the audio book just to hear Ed Westwick’s voice reading Jace’s snark? And what on earth do you make of this Jonathan business?




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