Thoughts On...City of Bones: Part 1

In this post I'll be talking about the City of Bones as a whole.  There are so many different things to talk about when taking on the novel City of Bones.  So, this post will be kind of an overview of thoughts on the book.  I started writing this blog post and even just generally there's too much to talk about in one post.  So, I've decided to split the book into its conveniently divided parts.  There are three parts to the City of Bones and in this post I'll discuss Part One: Dark Decent.  I've read this book at the very least three separate times, and it is still one of my favorites.  Well, technically anything in the Shadowhunter Chronicles universe falls into my list of favorites.

The first thing I'd like to talk about is how most everyone when thinking of Jace calls him arrogant and egotistical.  I'll admit this is kind of true, but what people most often fail to see is that Alec and Izzy are as well.  In the very first chapter "Pandemonium" we see our three young Shadowhunter heroes fighting and killing a demon in the Pandemonium club.  Clary, knowing nothing of the Shadow world, walks in on them killing the demon, but all she sees is them killing what she believes to be a human being.  What I saw during the interactions in this scene was Alec overlooking Clary to the point that she may as well not exist.  When Clary bursts into the room Alec says, "What's this?"  As if she isn't really a person, but an annoying inconvenience.  It appears to me that for Alec, this girl is a mundane and she is so non-existent that she may as well not even be there.  Then in this same scene we see Isabelle practically on the verge of attacking Clary because she got in the way of their demon slaying.  When Clary tried to run from the room Izzy attacks Clary with her electrum whip causing both pain and injury.  She even says to Jace, "What do you want me to do with her?"  This makes me think Izzy's intentions are not the nicest.  What I see in these two during this scene is that when it comes to mundanes they are just as arrogant as Jace comes off as being.

I'd also like to point one more thing out from this scene in "Pandemonium".  In both the show and the movie we, the readers, always see Alec getting mad at Jace for taking Clary to the Institute even though they think she is nothing more than a mundane.  But, what actually happens is quite the opposite.  It is our very own Alec Lightwood who suggests that they take Clary to the Institute to talk to Hodge.  "Maybe we should bring her back with us," Alec said.  "I bet Hodge would like to talk to her."  I find it interesting that it's law abiding Alec who wants to bring the Mundie to the Institute.  Because of the movie and the show its put into the back of our minds that Alec would never approve of it, but clearly it was Alec's idea.  Crazy to think about.

That being said, the next day when Jace goes to find Clary to bring her back to the Institute it's not even his idea.  Jace says, "Hodge said I have to bring you to the Institute with me.  He wants to talk to you." On both the big and little screens it is always Jace's rash decision to take Clary to the Institute, but what we see is that it is everyone's but Jace's idea.  It's an interesting thing to think about.

I always thought it was kind of strange how Jocelyn at the beginning of the novel decides to, quite literally out of the middle of nowhere, pack her and Clary up and take them out to Luke's farm.  Re-reading this chapter it doesn't appear that Clary told her mother that she saw Shadowhunters and demons the night before.  Yet, for some reason Jocelyn wants to uproot Clary for the summer without a word to her.  Obviously, Jocelyn it scared about something downworldy, but we don't ever actually know why.  And this for some reason bothers me.  I feel like there needs to be a reason for Jocelyn to do this, because Jocelyn never does anything without a reason, even if that reason is stupid she still has one.

I've noticed that some people don't like Clary because they don't think that Clary is really brave.  I've read some posts were people say that Clary isn't brave because she doesn't know what she's doing and by blundering in to situations makes things worse.  And if it weren't for Clary's ability to create runes that aren't in the Grey Book she wouldn't be interesting.  (If this is your opinion, I'm not saying you're wrong.  It's your opinion and everyone is entitled to their opinion.  Especially when it comes to subjective material like characters in a book).  I don't think this is true, in my opinion.  I don't think Clary blundering around not knowing what is going on and her being brave are mutually exclusive, and I don't see how one precludes the other.  I don't think Clary having been raised as a mundane and not knowing anything of significance about the shadow world means her actions aren't brave.

In Chapter four "Ravener" Clary races home after getting off the phone with her mother, who is in serious trouble.  When Clary gets there she ends up facing a demon on her own for the first time.  She is clearly afraid and even tries to run, far far away, but when it comes down to it she doesn't stop fighting.  Despite what can only be called mind numbing fear Clary never just lays down and let's the Ravener demon kill her.  To defend herself she shoves a sensor, stolen from Jace, down the demon's throat killing it.  Is that not bravery?

The Institute's libraries in all the different series' are important to the stories.  In the City of Bones alone Cassandra Clare takes a page and a half to describe the library as Clary sees it for the first time.  The library is were Hodge seems to give his most important lectures to our Shadowhunters.  It's were Valentine comes to Hodge to take the Mortal Cup, and where he abducts Jace from.  In the Infernal Devices novel Clockwork Angel the library of the London's Institute is even more important, because books are were both Tessa and Will go to escape the crazy world of demon hunting.  There are many places within the Institute that Clare could have put significance into, like a weapons room seeing as how they are demon fighting warriors.  I love that a library, with books and relics, is so important to the story.  Here we are sitting here reading books, so why can't books be just important to the characters we love.

I find it interesting that the information Jace and the others have seem to be selective.  In Chapter five "Clave and Covenant" Clary tells Jace and Hodge that a Witch lives downstairs from her and her mother.  Hodge immediately think that this neighbor, Madame Dorothea, must be a Warlock.  Jace than says, "She's like most witches - a fake," Jace said.  "I already looked into it.  There's no reason for any warlock to be interested in her unless he's in the market for nonfunctional crystal balls."  Jace took the time, and effort, to look into Madame Dorothea to find out that she isn't a real Warlock, but just a mundane.  Then why in Chapter six "Forsaken" does Madame Dorothea know all about the Downworld, and tell Jace that her adoptive parents were Warlocks.  It seems like to me that the local Conclave, a group of Shadowhunters in a certain area or region, would know about all the Warlocks in their area.   In the Infernal Devices novels the Shadowhunters of the York Institute, headed by Aloysius Starkweather, killed Warlocks John and Anne Shade for no more reason than they were raising a mundane boy.  This shows me that the Shadowhunters do keep track of Downworlders.  So, if that is the case then why does Jace, and those at the New York Institute, not know that Madame Dorothea's parents were Warlocks even when he went out of his way to look into her and her history.

I absolutely love how our young Shadowhunter heroes are so pop culture challenged.  In Chapter seven "The Five-Dimensional Door" when Jace tells Clary not to touch his weapons she says, "Well, there goes my plan for selling them all on eBay."  Jace immediately says, "Sell
them on what?"  Jace and the other Shadowhunters are always getting confused by Clary, and mostly Simon's, pop culture references.  It always makes me giggle.  They are so out of touch.

One thing I find interesting about Madame Dorothea is that despite that fact that she is a mundane she seems to be able to do, and see, certain things that only a Warlock should be able to do.  Also in Chapter seven Madame Dorothea gives Jace and Clary tea to drink and then reads their tea leaves.  This by itself isn't very Warlock-y, but it's what she says that has me thinking that more is going on.  She tells Clary that based on what she sees in the tea leaves tells her that there is a block in Clary's mind.  Having read the book I'm sure you know that this is true, seeing as how Magnus Bane blocked Clary's sight when she was a baby.  The question is how does a mundane like Madame Dorothea know this if she doesn't actually have magic because she's not a Warlock?  Just a thought.

Lets go back to Clary bumbling around not knowing what she's doing.  It's true she does, but it's actually to be expected.  I'd be surprised, and it wouldn't be very believable, if she didn't go around causing problems with her ignorance.  At the end of Chapter seven we see Clary blindly jumping through the Five-Dimensional Door not knowing were she and Jace, since of course he's going to jump through with Clary, are going to end up.  Kind of stupid really, but Clary's not thinking with her brain but her emotions.  So, despite her blind ignorance, which can sometimes be  annoying, I find Clary and her actions to be very believable.

There are two things I find interesting at the beginning of Chapter eight "Weapon of Choice."  The first being that throughout the entire conversation that Clary and Simon are having about where Clary has disappeared to for the last three days is the one thing that Jace comments on.  Simon says, "You were shacking up with some dyed-blond wannabe goth you probably met at Pandemonium."  Clary makes note to tell Simon she wasn't shacking up, and Jace?  What does Jace say?  "And my hair is naturally blond," Jace said.  "Just for the record."  It's comments like these that have people thinking Jace is an egotistical ass, but only at first glance.

The second thing is Simon tells Clary that he's in the bushes outside of Luke's bookstore because he saw Luke packing weapons into a duffel bag.  That seems reasonable enough, but for three whole days?  Does anybody else think it's weird that he's been hiding outside Luke's that entire time even though he hasn't seen any indication that Clary has been there, or would ever be there.  If Simon is looking for Clary, and being her best friend, wouldn't he have more than just Luke's place to look for her?  I don't know,  it's a thought.

The first time that I read the City of Bones I thought it was a little weird that Jace, and everyone, we're talking to and following Church, the cat, like he was a person.  But Church, the grumpiest cat in the world, is more than just a cat.  Church is a highly intelligent and problem solving animal that in his more than a hundred years of existence has only ever liked one Shadowhunter.  James, Jem, Carstairs but it's hard not to love him.  Church is a mystery, wrapped inside of an enigma, stuffed inside of a paradox.  Enough said.

I find it interesting that when Jace tells Clary that Alec has never killed a demon before that he tells her that he doesn't know why.  Yes, he does say afterwards that it's probably because he's always trying to protect Jace and Izzy.  He seems to genuinely not know why Alec has never killed a demon before, but he clearly knows why.  I'm just curious as to why he even says it.

Well, that seems to be all for today.  This post is already about twice as long as all the other Thoughts On... blogs and we're only a third of the way through the book.  So many more things to talk about.  So, stay tuned for upcoming post about the City of Bones and other fun and informative topics about the Shadowhunter Chronicles.

Till Next Time Friends,