I did it! I read the complete first trilogy of The Mortal Instruments! This definitely wasn’t on purpose, but I read City of Ashes and just knew that I wanted to continue on with the story (and seeing as I read City of Bones in 2018 I didn’t want to lose that motivation!). It is obvious that this was intended to be the end of the series, as everything is wrapped up in a nice little bow. However, if you didn’t know by now, my opinion of this series is that it’s trash YA (and that I’m trash along with it) so the nice little bow felt right! And don’t worry, this is a spoiler free review.
In this book we finally get to see things coming together. The character development across the previous two books has left these characters actually forming relationships with one another (not always friendships!) and the way in which this then impacts the storyline is really well done.
Having them finally visiting this city that they’ve mentioned so many times was a lot of fun and I enjoy the different ways that we get to learn about the city from the various perspectives and locations that people are in.
There was a BIG shock reveal in this book, but from the rampant spoilers on the internet I had already known about it! It just made me impatient to want to get to it! But it did make the pre-reveal sections read differently in my head than they would have been. I’m kinda fine with it having been spoilt.
There does seem to be a lack of development in the female characters compared to the males. I know so much more about the boys, and that’s saying something considering that our main character Clary is a girl. She still feels a little two dimensional (I would say one but she’s at least improved a little) compared to the four dimensional Jace or Simon. I did love Izzy in this book though, vastly more than previously.
Overall, this was a fun, if not particularly well written book. But I still do intend to carry on with these series’ and will be reading the first Infernal Devices book next!! (I’ve been told that’s a good order to go in). I do still hope that the quality of the writing, and the development of the female characters, improves, but the story itself is a lot of fun.
Abi of Pellinor 