City of Fallen Angels - Cassandra Clare

The review for this book contains spoilers for the first three books in this series: City of Bones, City of Ashes, and City of Glass. 

[Click the title of each book to read my reviews]

 

The Mortal War is over, and 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 important of all—Clary can finally call Jace her boyfriend.

But nothing comes without a price.

Someone is murdering the Shadowhunters who used to be in Valentine’s Circle, 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 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 wrecking his life. And they’re willing to do anything to get what they want. At the same time he’s dating two beautiful, dangerous girls—neither of whom knows about the other.

When Jace begins to pull away from Clary without explaining why, she 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.

 

I was extremely cautious when picking up this book, for a few different reasons the main one being that I wasn't sure if I'd like the direction that Cassandra Clare would go with the fourth book in her Immortal Instruments series. So, I did what any cautious reader would do, and I stalked YouTubers and GoodReaders to figure out whether or not I should actually read this book or not. I ended up reading it, and absolutely loving it. I shall explain:
1. More. Simon.
Simon was one of the characters that I felt that Cassie Clare could have expanded on. Throughout the first three books, he was just kind of there. There was no real depth to his character, besides him following Clary around like a lost and somewhat broken puppy. I love puppies, therefore, I love Simon. The thing that I didn't really like about Simon in this book, though, was the whole Mark of Caine thing. I knew that it would affect him, but the effects of the Mark weren't really shown. They were touched on, sure, but Cassie could have definitely expanded on the whole hurt-me-and-I'll-hurt-you-seven-times-worse thing. Also, in CoFA, you see more of a teenaged guy type to Simon. When you first start this book, you may be very surprised at Simon's relationship status. He is currently dating two people at the same time. Any guesses as to who these "mystery women" are? Well, I'm going to tell you anyway, because it's really obvious and it's not spoiling anything. Isabelle and Mia. Yep. Because that's not a train wreck waiting to happen. I mean COME ON SIMON, you know better than that. You'd think that after the whole Jace-Clary thing that Simon would be a little more sensative to other people's feelings, but whatever, I'm not going to rant about this. All you really need to know is that Simon becomes a key player in this book, which is a VERY good thing.
2. Cassie Clare's words.
If you've read this far into the series, you know what I'm talking about. Her cliffhangers are fantasticly torturous. ESPECIALLY at the end of this book. Words can't describe how much I want to read her next installment - City of Lost Souls. AND there's ANOTHOTHER HUGE cliffhanger at the end of the book. One day, I will ask Cassie Clare how she's mastered this astounding ability to create moments that both confuse and amaze readers.

The only thing that started to annoy me in this book was, dare I say it, Jace. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE Jace, but in this book he does some really stupid things. Not pick a fight with a bar filled with werewolves kind of stupid, but the more self destructive kind of stupid. Jace and Clary's relationship is still strained, and it just doesn't really do anything for the series at this point. I mean, though out the beginning of the series their relationship was a big deal, especially because of the whole incest thing, but it's starting to get tiresome. As I've previously stated: Jace = Awesome, (with a capital 'A') but he needs to be a bit less self loathing. Which is one of the things that I like about him, but the whole I-hate-my-life thing needs to be toned down a little bit.

Overall, I'd give this book a 4/5.