Saturday 31 May 2014

City of Heavenly Fire - FTM


I am coming.

Darkness returns to the Shadowhunter world. As their society falls apart around them, Clary, Jace, Simon and their friends must band together to fight the greatest evil the Nephilim have ever faced: Clary’s own brother. Nothing in the world can defeat him — must they journey to another world to find the chance? 
-Good-reads Synopsis 

To those who have read The Mortal Instruments series, we all know that the main Antagonists are Valentine and his son Sebastian Morgensten.  I'm sure a lot of readers have hated these characters, and so have I. Yes, Sebastian dies in this book but he didn't die as Sebastian, he died as Jonathan. His death was definitely a worthy death. It was probably one of the most beautiful death scenes that I have read, he died in the arms of his mother and sister and his last words were "I feel so light." Jonathan says that as Clary stabbed him, the heavenly fire burned all of the evil inside his veins. In this death scene, you could see real love between them, it was something that Sebastian never deserved but Jonathan did.  

So later on, Clary possesses her brothers ashes. She throws his ashes into the water and Clary says "Ave atque vale. Ave atque vale in perpetuum, frater. Hail and farewell forever, my brother." To me, that was such a memorable scene. Clary never loved Sebastian or even cared for him, but I love how she took the time to give her brother that moment. As I started to read this book, I had theories of Sebastian potentially not being evil anymore, not being the monster that he was and I'm so glad that Cassandra made that choice to give him such a memorable death. I noticed that as soon as he became Jonathan, all of the hate that I had toward Sebastian was suddenly lifted, I suddenly cared for Jonathan, I didn't want him to die. During his death, I kept having second thoughts about it being a trick, which thankfully it wasn't.

There was a total of five or six deaths in this book. The only deaths that had a really big effect on me were, Sebastian/Jonathan and Raphael. I didn't really mind Jordan's death, to be honest he wasn't a character that I really, really cared about. In the book, Maia was actually planning to break-up with Jordan because she didn't feel the love that she had before towards Jordan. I didn't really expect to care about Raphael's death. It think a large part of it was because of him almost killing Magnus. I loved that he refused because of a debt owed to Magnus before, but unfortunately it resulted to his death. The other deaths I didn't really care about, well Maureen. I was so happy when she died, she was crazy and she needed to be put down or something.

One thing that REALLY bugged me about this book is that Cassandra would do this trickery thing. She will make you think that a major character that you deeply care about is going to die, then they will be instantly cured or healed. An example of this would be Isabelle being bit/slashed by some messed up crazy demon. Everyone is panicking and at this point SO AM I! I'm like "Oh my gosh, is she going to die?! What's happening?!" Clary tries runes, which doesn't work and I'm siting there reading and thinking shes going to die. No, Simon goes up bites himself and starts pouring his blood all over Isabelle's wound. For some reason, I thought he was going to turn her into a vampire. "Oh! This is how Isabelle and Simon are going to live together forever!" is what I thought.

Speaking of Simon, I was panicking wondering how everything would resolve itself somehow. In the demon dimension, there is no way out of this realm. The only person who is able to transport them out of the dimension, is Magnus's father who is one of the nine princes of hell, Asmodeus. I hated him so much. He offered to transport Clary and her friends back to Idris for one price. Magnus's immortality and to keep him in the realm forever and have him basically rot. Simon being Simon willingly volunteers himself. Asmodeus says he will take his immortality but he will not remember anything of the shadowhunter world. I was expecting everyone to rise up and kill him but that didn't happen. During this whole process of taunting and begging, Asmodeus finally starts to remove his memories of the shadowhunter world. Everyone around him can see the memories, literally flashing before their eyes. That scene was so beautifully written. After all of the chaos is over, they're back in Alicante. Isabelle says "He's gone, he's really gone." It was so touching, and I thought that this is how this book was going to end, losing one of the most beloved characters. Thankfully, Simon starts to regain his memory of the shadowhunter world and Clary!

We are also introduced to new characters who are actually the characters in Cassandra's new series that will be released, fall 2015/2016. Emma Carastairs, is a brave twelve year old girl. Her best friend is Julian/Jules. They have such a cute relationship, and they actually discuss becoming parabati. As I read this part, I knew that in The Dark Artifices, they will start to develop feelings for each other but they will have to face the issues of the parabati bond. I could be wrong, but you can see their relationship going down that road. We all know, that the Mortal Instruments series has a long history of very complicated relationships with almost every single character.

I am trying so hard not to make this review too long. I'm pretty sure it already has. City of Heavenly Fire was a great ending to the series, it wasn't rushed. It was definitely worth the 725 pages! I could go on and on about this book but I won't. It's so sad that the series has come to an end, but hopefully city of ashes will become a movie soon enough. It left on such a happy note, and that's every readers dream to not have a sad ending. Saying goodbye to the series is so bittersweet, but we will have a new series with new amazing characters which I am so excited for. Everything about this book was so amazing! Cassandra is such an amazing author, and I wish she could continue on with the series. City of Heavenly fire has taken the spot of my favourite book, and is currently being displayed. The thing that sucks, is that I'm currently in a huge BOOK HANGOVER! 

I would rate this book a 10 out of 5 stars because it was so amazing that it goes over the five start limit! I love Cassandra's writing and I am so excited for new projects! I hope you enjoyed this review!

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