City of Heavenly Fire
City of Heavenly Fire is the final piece of Clary Fray's story. It encompasses the shadowhunters' ongoing battle with Sebastian Morgenstern while also introducing the new characters of Cassandra Clare's later series, The Dark Artifices. It also brings back characters from her prequel series, The Infernal Devices, giving readers extreme nostalgia for the old series. DO NOT READ THIS BOOK IF YOU HAVE NOT READ BOTH SERIES. Cassandra Clare's final installment is a thrilling race to the end, filled with romance and humor (two of my favorite qualities in a book), and it was probably my favorite of the whole series.
*****SPOILERS*****
Before we discuss, I must get out my unpopular opinion: I don't like Clary. I think she's whiny. Now now, before you send me hate mail, let me explain. I fully respect her as a strong female lead, and an interesting narrator, but compared to Cassandra's other main characters, shes just...under developed. I mean Tessa was so interesting and clever while being tortured and conflicted. And TDA hasn't even come out yet, and I'm already in love with Emma Cartairs. Personally, I value intelligence over all other qualities,and sometimes Clary is just dumb. Like, i feel myself saying "Oh my god, Clary, that was just plain stupid." My Clary opinion was mostly based off the previous books, and after this one it has changed.
In this book, I feel like Clary has really matured and fulfilled her role as a shadowhunter. She also opens up to Jace more, which I think really helped her out. And not being able to touch hi extensively for the majority of the book, made her feel like more of an important character, than some whiny bitch clinging onto Jace with a stele in her hand.
Oh Jace. Jace, Jace, Jace. Jace really brought himself up in my opinion in this book. He really became a Herondale. Selfless, and thinking of others. I was crying when he went to check up on Brother Zachariah, mostly because of Jem, but it was really sweet.
"When Clary stabbed me with Glorious, it was- agonizing. I felt as if my bones were melting down to ashes inside me. I kept thinking about that when I woke up- I kept thinking about the pain, and whether it hurt when you touched me."
Zachariah looked at him in surprise. "You thought about me? About whether I was in pain?"
"Of course."
I feel like Jace learned a lot about what it means to be a Herondale, to value your parabatai over all else, to put the ones you love before Convenant Law, and many others that Will would have been proud of. I have one question for Jace. Do you always bring a condom with you into the demon realms? Just thought "even though I can't touch her because of the heavenly fire, I'll just bring one anyway!" Maybe he thought Isabelle and Simon might need it.
OH MY GOD LETS TALK ABOUT SIZZY. They were so adorable! They're conversations are so much more interesting than Jace and Clary's. The whole Lord Montgomery thing cracked me up. I was laughing so hard. And later, when Izzy said "I think we have established in so many ways that I am hot enough for the both of us." LOL. And then we Isabelle was dying...I was so afraid she was one of the six. Alec was going to be crushed. And then Simon came to the rescue! And Jace backed him up. Oh god it was so intense!!!! But then Sizzy got it on, so it wasn't that sad.
And then Alec walked in on them, for the second time. "WHY DOES THIS KEEP HAPPENING? WHY CANT YOU GO SOMEWHERE ELSE TO DO THESE HORRIBLE THINGS? MY EYES." I have so much respect for Alec after this book. "Straight people," Alex declared. "Why can't they control themselves?" He basically just summed up the current world. He will now and forever be remembered for his pie making abilities and for not being Jace's bitch. OH MY GOD I LAUGHED SO HARD. And then I cried with happiness when he and Magnus got back together.
Catarina was right. Magnus is happy with Alec and he needs him. They're reunion was so sad.
Magnus exhaled-for a moment he no longer felt ill,or afraid of dying, or even angry or bitter. Relief washed over him, as profound as sorrow, and he reached up to brush the cheek of the boy leaning over him with the back of his bruised knuckles. Alec's eyes were huge and blue and full of anguish. "Oh, my Alec," he said. "You've been so sad. I didn't know." 😭
For so long, the prospect of Magnus's dad scared the crap out of me. I was terrified of what would happen when we finally met him. And Holy Crap, when it happened... I was hysterically sobbing. "Oh no Magnus is going to die! He's 400 years old! Oh wait Simon volunteered. He's only 17 this could work! Oh shit wait. He'll be a corpse. Asmodeus is going to make him a mortal? That's awfully nice of him. BUT WAIT THERES MORE. HE'LL NEVER REMEMBER THEM. 😭😭😭😭"
I soon as Simon was gone, I knew something was up. Cassandra would never throw away a character like Simon with no closure. Then I was terrified that Clary's phone call with him was the only closure we were gonna get. And then they went a visited him and THE BAND POSTER. I CALLED IT. I KNEW IT. I EFFING KNEW IT. I didn't know how they were going to reintroduce him, but how did none of us think of ascension as soon as he became mortal! Cassandra revealed that that had been the plan since City of Glass, and it was even foreshadowed in the first book! And now he and Clary can be parabatai and he can marry Isabelle and everything can work out.
Now, I haven't discussed the Blackthorn children (all 8 million of them) and Emma Carstairs. I have already expressed my love for Emma, my strong badass blonde. (From the amount of times I've mentioned that Emma was blonde, you might have gathered that I, too, am blonde. Did I mention our new badass female main character is blonde?). Her bond with Julian is beautiful and I can't wait to delve more into their relationship in TDA, but when they decided to become parabatai (for reasons I understand), I was like "girl you're gonna regret that in a few years. WHY CANT YoU SEE THAT YOU LOVE HIM?" And Julian, poor Julian. When he killed his own father I literally said, out loud "Yep there's his tragic backstory. That's the moment that will scare him for life." My poor baby!!!
Of the rest of the Blackthorns, I was really only interested in three of them: Helen, Mark, and Ty. Mark mostly because I feel he's going to be important to the new series as the faerie hostage, and with his and Helen being affair children. I love shadowhunter politics! We already know Helen from previous books and her relationship with Aline. I also love her bond with her siblings and how she's already taken on her role as the mother of this family. BUT THEN THE EFFING SHADOWHUNTERS SENT HER AWAY. I WAS SO MAD. It broke my heart when Julian sat down at the table with his head in his hands, and said "I'm only 12 and I'm about to have 4 kids!". And he's right. No twelve year old should have to be the father of a huge family. Their family is in for a rough road.
I'm very intrigued about Ty. He might become my favorite character of TDA besides Emma, but I don't know, I haven't read them. With all the mentioning of him being extremely intelligent, but not getting along with others, and only letting his sister touch him, I think Cassandra was eluding to autism. I love that she may be touching on things like that in her books as well as including LGBTQ characters. My theory was also helped along when Helen said "Ty is special. He...translates the world differently from how the rest of us do. Not everyone can speak his language, but you can." I can't wait to see how his character evolves and if he appears in The Wicked Powers, the final series of the shadowhunter chronicles, set three years after TDA.
And, now I've saved the best for last. My favorite character of TID, and the most eloquent. Jem. Anything that comes out of his mouth is beautiful. Have an example:
-"Herondales. I had almost forgotten. No other family does so much for love, or feels so much pain for it. Don't carry the weight of the world on you, Jace. It's too heavy for even a Herondale to bear."
Any scene he was in, I just squealed with delight and nostalgia. When he mentioned Will or Tessa, I just cried. Always crying. I positively sobbed, just tears streaming down my face, when he talked to Jace about parabatai and when the payed his respects to that dead shadowhunter. Holy crap Jem. I'm still bothered that he didn't reclaim his name. He explained why he didn't tell Emma he was a Carstairs, but he could have let people call him Jem! Even in the epilogue with Tessa. And holy shit, the epilogue. Tessa and Jem talking to Clary. And Tessa. I just....sobbing. Tessa and Jem discussing Emma was so sweet, about if she'll play the violin, and THEN THEY SAID THEY WERE HEADED TO LA. I hope they're in TDA a lot. And them talking about Will. And did anyone else see the comic strip at the end? With Jem and Tessa's wedding? It's only in the Australian and UK edition, so if you haven't seen it, look it up on the internet.
I can't explain how much I loved the epilogue. With Izzy and Simon dancing, and Alec and Magnus happy, and Alec trying to make up with his dad. Oh god it was so sweet. And everyone down at the lake after JEM STOLE HIS CAT BACK. LOL. It just felt like the perfect ending to this series.
*****SPOILERS*****
Comments
Post a Comment