City of Fallen Angels
by Cassandra Clare
Reviewed by Ruby
With everything finally over, Clary now has time to reconnect with her mother and begin her Shadowhunter training. Only life is never that simple and the consequences of her actions are turning out to be deadly.
Simon has picked up a cult of stalkers that are trying to kill him while a very powerful vampire is trying to recruit him. And Jace is having nightmares that are so realistic that he thinks he’s going crazy.
All the while there is something powerful lurking, pulling at all the strings and it is out for blood.
Do you know what I hate more than unresolved sexual tension between characters I can’t stand? Forced discord in a relationship solely because there needs to be tension and the author can’t think of any other way to accomplish it.
Just because Jace is having nightmares doesn’t mean he had to suddenly start avoiding Clary like she has the plague and there doesn’t have to be random characters that show up only to put doubt in Clary’s mind about him. The nightmare storyline has to happen, yes, but if they had actually talked about it then all the time wasted with their annoying crap could have been used to focus on some other characters and not write them out or have them hovering around in the background for half the book. Unfortunately the discord doesn’t end with Clary and Jace because Alec and Magnus spent most of their all too few scenes together fighting. And let’s not forget Simon and his two girlfriends. Ugh it’s like a soap opera for teenagers. But the sad thing is, that if you remove all the teenage angst, it’s very enjoyable. The scenes between Jace and Simon with their mutual respect and yet complete dislike for each other are hilarious and actually show off their character’s personalities. It’s wading through the crap to get to the good scenes that is staring to get on my nerves. Grade: B Coral's Review. I’m not sure I have anything else to add to what my sister felt.
The forced tension between Clary and Jace is ridiculous. Does their relationship really need to be the focus of every book?
Some of that time would have been better spent on other characters, like Alec and Magnus, who are also having random relationship issues in this book. This story line needed more of a build up because it really feels like it comes out of nowhere in this book, where all of a sudden Alec is jealous of Magnus’ past.
Maybe I would have liked the book better if not every story line in the book centered on relationship drama. I don’t understand why we had to have the Clary/Jace problems, the Alec/Magnus problems and Simon and his issues with Isabelle and Maia.
I know as soon as the character of Kyle was introduced that he would end up playing a larger part in the story, but I don’t like where they seem to be going with the character. There are a lot of issues surrounding the character that seem very problematic to me.
Thinking about the book, there really wasn’t one thing about it that I liked.
Grade: F
