Thoughts On...City of Bones: Part 3

Today I'd like to finish my thoughts about the City of Bones novel.  This time on Part 3: The Descent Beckons.  So, let's get started.

In Chapter twenty one "The Werewolf's Tale" Luke says that he and Jocelyn were sent to Alicante to go to school as teenagers.  If you've read the book "Tales From the Shadowhunter Academy" than you know that it was at this same Academy that the young Shadowhunters of the Circle met at and attended schooling.  If you've read it than you also know that the Academy isn't actually in the City of Glass, Alicante, but a bit of the ways out side the city.  This is just a bit of a consistency thing for me, doesn't quite track.

At the end of Chapter twenty one Luke says that all the living members of the Circle, except Michael Wayland, were exiled to   the New York Institute and that was one of the reason in the end he found himself going to New York.  I find it interesting that Jocelyn, the missing member of the Circle, also found herself in New York.  She had no way of knowing that the Lightwoods would ultimately be banished to the New York Institute.  So, what was it about New York that seemed to draw all this ex-dissidents to this one place, out of everywhere in the world?   It's interesting to think about.

At the beginning of Chapter twenty two "Renwick's Run"  Clary is disillusioned about who she always believed her father to be.  In his story Luke tells her that Valentine is actually her father.  My question is, why is Clary so surprised by this?  I mean while you were reading the book for the first time, not knowing that Valentine was Clary's father, where you surprised when this revelation was announced?  I know that I wasn't.  And after all the lies Jocelyn has told Clary, and all the secrets that she has kept from her daughter, why is this particular lie so hard for Clary to believe.  Is it just because she doesn't want it to be true, because he is a psychopath?  It's possible, but it seems as if Clary is genuinely surprised to find this out.

Also, in this Chapter Luke tells Clary that it makes sense that the Lightwoods would look after Michael Wayland's son because they were close.  I always love going back and rereading and knowing the meaning behind things that I didn't know before.  We know that Michael Wayland used to be Robert Lightwood's Parabatai, and that alone should be enough for the Lightwoods to take in Jace when they believed he was Michael's son.  But if you've also read "The Tales From the Shadowhunter Academy"  then you also know that Robert Lightwood may have also taken in Jace as a way to assuage the guilt he may feel over the way he shunned and turned his back on his Parabatai after Michael proclaimed his true feelings for Robert.

When Luke says in "Renwick's Run" to Clary, "I hated the idea of the Lightwoods turning you into  a copy of them," Clary just nods her head saying they haven't.  Yet, in just the previous Chapter she was geeing mad a Luke and defending the Lightwoods, and that they weren't like that.  Now, all of a sudden she just agrees that they are downworlder hating Shadowhunters?  I feel like Clary, as we've seen her so far, would have added a 'because they aren't like that', or something else to that effect.  In my opinion anyway.

In Chapter 23 "Valentine" when we, the reader, first find out that Jace believes he is Valentine's son I find it interesting that Jace has so quickly turned his back on the people he loves.  The Lightwoods are his family, even if not by blood, but the second he thinks Valentine is his father he is willing to follow him blindly?  That just doesn't seem like the Jace we have been getting to know.  I get that he believed his father dead, and now alive, but still.  Jace is headstrong and not willing to just follow the rules because he is told.  Where did that Jace go.  Does anyone else think that Jace's personality did a complete 180*?

Also in Chapter 23 when Luke and Valentine are fighting each other Jace restrains Clary to stop her from jumping into the middle of the fight.  Jace says to her, "You don't understand.  That's how its done."  That's how what's done Jace?  Murdering people because you want to?  Again, it seems like Jace got a little more brainwashed in a day than seems reasonable.

It's finally Clary mentioning Alec and Isabelle's love for Jace that gets Jace to stop being an insufferable ass and do what was right.  Jace remembers that he has more than just his "long lost" father as family, and that the Lightwood's are just as much his family.  He doesn't let Valentine murder Luke in cold blood, and even tells him to leave.  Looks like Jace is back.

At the end of Chapter 23 I like how when Valentine tells Jace how Clary is like her mother that "She doesn't do what she is told."  Clary didn't do what Jace told her to, but why does she have to?  Jace isn't her boss, or superior, he can't actually tell her what to do.  Just like Jocelyn didn't have to follow what Valentine told her just because she was his wife.  It seems like Valentine is still living in a age gone by.

In the Epilogue "The Ascent Beckons" Clary and Luke are discussing Jocelyn's coma.  Clary is talking about her new found brother, Jace, and how Jocelyn knowing her son is alive might help her come out of her coma.  If Luke and Jocelyn were as close as Luke says back in the Circle days would Jocelyn have told Luke about his experiments on a pregnant Jocelyn and her son having demon blood.  If so, and Luke knows about this why don't we get any hint of this at all in the way Luke talks about Jace and everything going on?  Just a thought.

Well, it looks like we've finally come to the end of the first book in The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones.  I hope you had as much fun reading about my Thoughts On... the book as I did remembering it.  If you're jumping into this blog of mine here in part three go to my profile page and you can find my thoughts on the rest of the novel in Parts 1 & 2.  I'll see you next week with a whole new subject.

Till Next Time Friends,