City of Bones (The Mortal Instruments #1) by Cassandra Clare

City of Bones
Series: The Mortal Instruments
by Cassandra Clare
My Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐
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When fifteen-year-old Clary Fray heads out to the Pandemonium Club in New York City, she hardly expects to witness a murder― much less a murder committed by three teenagers covered with strange tattoos and brandishing bizarre weapons. Then the body disappears into thin air. It’s hard to call the police when the murderers are invisible to everyone else and when there is nothing―not even a smear of blood―to show that a boy has died. Or was he a boy?

This is Clary’s first meeting with the Shadowhunters, warriors dedicated to ridding the earth of demons. It’s also her first encounter with Jace, a Shadowhunter who looks a little like an angel and acts a lot like a jerk. Within twenty-four hours Clary is pulled into Jace’s world with a vengeance when her mother disappears and Clary herself is attacked by a demon. But why would demons be interested in ordinary mundanes like Clary and her mother? And how did Clary suddenly get the Sight? The Shadowhunters would like to know…

I read City of Bones for the first time back in 2015 according to Goodreads. I sadly didn’t keep up with the series after book 5 for some reason. After seeing so many people doing rereads to prepare for Queen of Air and Darkness, I wanted to see if I was missing out by not finishing it. I was also a little skeptical by my four star rating that I gave it since I wasn’t as critical of a reader then as I am now.

Well, I can say that with even being a critical reader now, my four star rating still held up for me. I started this on a whim and didn’t want to read any other book until I was finished with it. I was still drawn in immediately soon as I cracked it open.

There were quite a few topics that were still relevant today that’s here in this book. Mainly we have homophobia and racism playing a huge part in this book. We are introduced to a gay character that plays a big part of the story. I hate that he felt the need to hide for fear that his friends and family would understand or look at him differently.

“You can’t be gay and a Shadowhunter?”

We also have different social classes here. We have Mundanes, Shadowhunters, and Downworlders. The racism that I mentioned earlier was because of the animosity between the Shadowhunters and the Downworlders. A lot of Shadowhunters look down on the Downworlders because have demon blood or have demon diseases. Some of them even wanted to rid the world completely of Downworlders.

Moving on, I know everyone feels differently about the relationship between Jace and Clary. It’s an either “you love it or you hate it” type. I for one am for the relationship between them. I forgot how much I enjoyed the banter between them in this book.

“It’s not gray,” Clary felt compelled to point out. “It’s green.”
“If there was such a thing as terminal literalism, you’d have died in childhood,” said Jace.

Clary was a bit all over the place to me. Parts naïve, fearless, and a little bitchy. She grew on me later on throughout the book. Jace had me laughing as soon as he was introduced! I did remember loving him the first time I read this book. He’s just a guy who wants people to care about him. He wants a family. The reason he lashes out and only shows a hard exterior is because he’s self conscious about his upbringing.

Along with Jace and Clary, we also had so many other characters that we get introduced to. I for one adored Isabelle and Magnus while side eyeing a bit at Simon.

Now while I really did enjoy reading this one, I had to knock off a star because of Clare’s writing. It was so choppy here. I have heard that her writing does get better as this story goes along so I’m pretty excited to read that and see her grow as an author.

So this was a great reread and I’m excited to move onto City of Ashes!

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