City of Bones: Epilogue
The hospital hallway was blindingly white. After so many days living by torchlight, gaslight, and eerie witchlight, the fluorescent lighting made things look sallow and unnatural. When Clary signed herself in at the front desk, she noticed that the nurse handing her the clipboard had skin that looked strangely yellowish under the bright lights. Maybe she’s a demon, Clary thought, handing the clipboard back. “Last door at the end of the hall,” said the nurse, flashing a kind smile. Or I could be going crazy.
Just a reminder that this book is actually capable of being decent. I like the sort of shell-shocked, totally-out-of-it feel to this passage, like she’s been through some shit and now she just sort of floats through the ‘real’ world, not quite processing it as a normal person. It works. It’s just the rest of the book that doesn’t.
City of Bones: Ch 23
Ladies and Gents, this is the last chapter. Let’s sit back and think for a minute about what our climax involves. The plot, if we can call it as much, has revolved around one thing: Clary’s mom is missing. That has been the only thing consistent through this book, and it’s been a pretty weak thread. Other things have come and gone, but Clary’s mom has always been missing. We’re now heading into the final chapter, and Clary’s mom is no longer missing. So what’s left for our big climax? Daddy issues. Seriously, that’s what we’ve got going into this. Fucking daddy issues.
City of Bones: Ch 22
Clary asks Luke about the military guy that she thought was her father. Turns out he was the son of an old neighbor, and Jocelyn just told Clary he was her father. (But he actually did die in a car crash, and he was in the Army.) Clary’s father is Valentine, but I don’t give a fuck, because it doesn’t matter. Seriously, unless this world involves some sort of hereditary magic, it doesn’t matter and I’m rather sick of books trying to tell me it does.
I will grant you that Clary can feel shocked by this news, as it’s something to deal with, but I’m still sick of seeing it in stories.
City of Bones: Ch 21
This chapter begins “Part Three, The Descent Beckons.” Why do I bring this up? Well, because I can’t figure out why it exists. We’re not entering a new story arc, we’re just continuing right along from the last chapter. If we wanted to get into a new arc, it should have happened back when Jace got kidnapped and Hodge turned traitor. But this here? This is nothing. And it’s not done for aesthetic reasons, because these ‘Parts’ aren’t split up in any logical manner. Part Three here only has the final three chapters in it. So what the fuck is the point of the split?
City of Bones: Ch 20
Clary finally finds her voice and yells for Hodge to let her go. Why she wasn’t doing this the whole time Valentine was there, we’ll never know. Hodge refuses to let her out because she’ll try and kill him, but…she’s a 16 year-old girl with no training and he’s part of the a group of super-ninjas. Eh, I guess it would be inconvenient to have to brush her off.
City of Bones: Ch 19
Guess what? MORE BANTER! This time they are joking about how normal-sized the cup is. Dorthea wants to see the cup.
she took a step toward Clary, holding her long red-nailed hands out for the Cup. Clary, without knowing why, shrank back.
Oh, come on! This is just painful, now. If Clary doesn’t know why she shrank back, then why did she do it? Does this author just have an allergy to people using their fucking brains? Dorthea does an attitude 180 from the last chapter in the space of a second, and she’s “gimme gimme” enough to make anyone give pause, so why can’t Clary be hesitant for the obvious fucking reasons? Usually I can figure out the reasoning behind bad tropes, but this one continues to flummox me. I just don’t understand why it became a trope in the first place.
City of Bones: Ch 18
Suddenly, we switch to Jace’s POV! I guess Clary was figuring out too much shit, so we had to move over to the guy who’s just sitting on his bed and sulking. Since, as we all know, figuring shit out is just a no-no in YA books. No one wants to read about that.
City of Bones: Ch 17
Have I mentioned yet that nearly every description in this book is a simile? Most of them hold up decently on their own, but there’s just so many of them. It’s like nothing is allowed to just look like itself, it always has to be something else first. And that doesn’t even get into the particularly egregious times when a person looks like a shadow or a bird looks like a hunchback. This book really has something against simple, evocative descriptions. It’s mind-boggling.
Just for a demonstration, at the end of this chapter, I’m going to list every single simile I had to read through today.
City of Bones: Ch 16
They get back home and Hodge rants and rails. In typical YA fashion, the text treats this as if Hodge is about as relevant as the “WAHWAH” noise that adults make in Charlie Brown. Nope, sorry, not buying what you’re selling book. Hodge has every right to yell at you for being total dumbasses, and you should listen to him. You won’t, though, because you are teenagers. And yet you’re going to continue to pretend that you’re “just as mature” as any adult, despite very clearly here being as typical as a typical teenager can get.
City of Bones: Ch 15
Raph calls the werewolves “Los Niños de la Luna.” Man, can you imagine shouting that as a warning to someone? Instead of just going “Shit, lob hombre!” you take the time to spout off a whole mouthful? I swear to god, this book does not care about context or realism, just about how pretty a group of sounds can be.
