City of Bones Chapter 1

Chapter Summary: After two pretentious epigraphs, we are introduced to Clary the Mary Sue and her “best friend” Simon.

There is also bad exposition and Clary’s designated love interest Sir Douche A Lot appears. And to add a cherry on top of the shit sundae, Isabelle is slut-shamed.

I have not slept.

Between the acting of a dreadful thing

And the first motion, all the interim is

Like a phantasma, or a hideous dream:

The Genius and the mortal instruments

Are then in council; and the state of man,

Like to a little kingdom, suffers then

The nature of an insurrection.

—William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar

1. This passage is about when Brutus decides that he is going to kill Julius Caesar.
2. Brutus says from the time when a person decides to do a terrible thing to the moment it is committed, everything feels like a terrible dream.
3. He also adds that a person’s body and conscience will oppose the wicked thought.
4. The villain doesn’t have any remorse for his actions.
5. And the alleged heroes are fascist assholes so this epigraph doesn’t fit.

I sung of Chaos and eternal Night,

Taught by the heav'nly Muse to venture down

The dark descent, and up to reascend…

—John Milton, Paradise Lost

1. Again, this epigraph doesn’t fit with the story.
2. This portion is about John Milton invoking the Holy Spirit, referring to it as “the heav'nly Muse.”
3. These lines have nothing to do with the plot of City of Bones.
4. In conclusion?
5. Cassandra Clare used two quotes from classic literature in order to sound like she writes deep and important lit-ra-choor.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” the bouncer said, folding his arms across his massive chest.

“I can’t possibly be in a story that was based on Harry Potter fanfiction. That would be fifty shades of wrong.”

The fifty or so teenagers in line outside the Pandemonium Club leaned forward to eavesdrop.

1. Riiiight. Because teenagers would be interested in hearing a bouncer telling somebody off.
2. It seems more likely that they would be annoyed with having to wait in line.
3. And we are supposed to marvel at how clever and subtle Cassandra Clare is.
4. Pandemonium is the capital of Hell in Paradise Lost.

We find out that the Pandemonium Club is an all-ages club and the story takes place on a Sunday.

The bouncers were fierce and would come down instantly on anyone who looked like they were going to start trouble.

Isn’t that what bouncers are supposed to do?

Now, it is time to introduce the Mary Sue!

Fifteen-year-old Clary Fray, standing in line with her best friend, Simon, leaned forward along with everyone else, hoping for some excitement.

1. This sentence is something you would find in a bad fanfic.
2. Character’s name + age + where they are + current action= sentence
3. At a glance, Clary Fray doesn’t sound bad. Her name doesn’t mean “Beautiful Swan.”
4. But consider this. Doesn’t Clary sound similar to Clare [Claire]?
5. And “Fray” is also the surname of Melaka Fray.
6. The club must be very boring if they think someone getting kicked out of the club is riveting.
7. “Aw, come on.” The kid hoisted the thing up over his head. It looked like a wooden beam, pointed at one end. “It’s part of my costume.”
8. I don’t go to clubs but do people usually wear costumes?
9. He’s carrying a “wooden beam” so his costume is a carpenter?

So the bouncer asks what is his costume and the boy grins.

He was normal-enough-looking, Clary thought, for Pandemonium.

Most people had legs of a spider.

He had electric blue dyed hair that stuck up around his head like the tendrils of a startled octopus, but no elaborate facial tattoos or big metal bars through his ears or lips.

1. Having hair like a “tendrils of the startled octopus”?
2. ‘Ello bizarre hairstyle.
3. So having facial tattoos or piercings is considered Abby Normal? (Virtual cupcake to anyone who gets that reference).

So Anime Boy says that he is a “vampire hunter.”

He pushed down on the wooden thing.

1. Don’t do that in public, Dude! You are going to get arrested!
2. Wait… Clare meant the beam. But now, she is calling it a “wooden thing."
3. Oh, Cassandra Clare, your prose is amazing.

A.B. (Anime Boy) tells the bouncer that the beam/wooden thing is made out of foam rubber.

The boy’s wide eyes were way too bright a green, Clary noticed: the color of antifreeze, spring grass.

This boy is not a filthy muggle mundane! Our Sue would never be sexually attracted to an ordinary boy.

Clary convinces herself that the boy must be wearing colored contact lenses. The bouncer is "bored” and allows A.B. into the club.

The boy slid past him, quick as an eel.

1. See what Cassandra Clare did?
2. She’s subtly telling us that A.B. is a devious and untrustworthy scoundrel.

Clary liked the lilt to his shoulders,

1. Technically, lilt can be used to describe movement.
2. But shoulders do not really “swing.”
3. Clare should have used the word “lift”.
4. In the English language, the word “lilt” is almost always used to describe a sound NOT a movement.

the way he tossed his hair as he went.

He was so fieeerce!

There was a word for him that her mother would have used—insouciant.

1. So Cassandra Clare Mommy Dearest is a thesaurus rapist.
2. According to Merriam Webster, insouciant is a light-hearted unconcern or nonchalance.

“You thought he was cute,” said Simon, sounding resigned. “Didn’t you?”

Oh, lookie here! Simon is the dorky best friend that is in love with a girl but he has never told her how he feels.

And the girl is so clueless to realize that he has the hots for her even though it is painfully obvious. Also, the guy will never get the girl.

Clary responds by elbowing Simon in the ribs. We get some descriptions of what the club looks like.

It has “dry-ice smoke” and has colored lights and how it turns everything into a “multicolored fairyland.”

We get it, C. Clare. This is a YA urban fantasy novel. You are not being subtle.

It turns out that Anime Boy has a long blade.

He used some glamour to make the weapon look harmless and persuade the bouncer to let him in the club.

Of course, he could probably have gotten by without all that trouble, but it was part of the fun—fooling the mundies, doing it all out in the open right in front of them, getting off on the blank looks on their sheeplike faces.

Fun fact WTF Fact: Did you know that the word mundane or mundie is used as an ethnic slur?

You know what is the sad thing is?

The designated love interest is a racist douche and an unrepentant murderer but the author is hellbent on depicting him as Prince Charming.

Not that the humans didn’t have their uses.

Ask any house cat! Somebody has to feed them and clean the litter box!

The boy’s green eyes scanned the dance floor, where slender limbs clad in scraps of silk and black leather appeared and disappeared inside the revolving columns of smoke as the mundies danced.

1. Not going to happen.
2. Having a club filled with large columns of smoke is a lawsuit waiting to happen.
3. “Oh no! I was dancing in a column of smoke when I fell down the stairs! I’m gonna sue the shit out of Pandemonium !”
4. It is also unsafe.

We are told that the girls have long hair and the boys wear leather pants. They are also sweaty.

Vitality just poured off them, waves of energy that filled him with a drunken dizziness.

It would be a very awkward situation if hellspawn drunkenly slipped and accidentally impaled himself with his own weapon.

His lip curled. They didn’t know how lucky they were.

They weren’t going to high school for the billionth time!

They didn’t know what it was like to eke out life in a dead world, where the sun hung limp in the sky like a burned cinder.

It is bad enough that I’m reading a story written by a plagiarist…

Now I have to endure pretentious bullcrap that can be found in any John Green novel?!

Their lives burned as brightly as candle flames—and were as easy to snuff out.

We get it, Cassandra Clare. You want us to think that talking about death and murder is edgy.

A.B. is getting ready to murder everyone when a girl begins walking towards him.

His plan to commit redrum is dumb because the ridiculous amounts of dry ice and flashing lights are not going to distract people from noticing a massacre.

A.B. stares at the girl.

She was beautiful, for a human—

To be sexy, she needs to have horns and cloven hooves!

long hair nearly the precise color of black ink, charcoaled eyes.

1. Cassandra Clare does not realize that “charcoal makeup” is not charcoal.
2. Being a writer, she should know the right words to use.
3. This line would be better if she had said “smoky.”
4. Because right now, it sounds like the girl took some charcoal and rubbed it on her eyes.

Floor-length white gown, the kind women used to wear when this world was younger.

What does C. Clare mean by “when this world was younger?”

From what time period? Medieval? Ancient Greece? Or is it from Biblical times?

Now that I’m thinking about it, only two costumes have been mentioned. It seems that everyone else ISN’T wearing costumes.

We also find out the girl has “slim arms”.

Around her neck was a thick silver chain, on which hung a dark red pendant the size of a baby’s fist.

Just wow. This is just as bad when J.K. Rowling described Hagrid’s hands as being the size of trash can lids.

He only had to narrow his eyes to know that it was real—real and precious.

1. What is real?
2. The chain? Or the red pendant?
3. Why wasn’t this book edited?

Anime Boy’s mouth is watering.

Vital energy pulsed from her like blood from an open wound.

I could be wrong but doesn’t blood ooze from an open wound?

The girl gives him bedroom eyes.

He turned to follow her, tasting the phantom sizzle of her death on his lips.

“Phantom sizzle”? And people believe that Cassandra Clare is a great writer…

It was always easy. He could already feel the power of her evaporating life coursing through his veins like fire.

1. Again with the weird descriptions.
2. So absorbing the girl’s life force is burning him?

Humans were so stupid.

“Ask any Nazi Shadowhunter! They would say that humans are stupid and inferior beings.”

Even though humans have something “precious” but they “barely safeguarded it.”

They threw away their lives for money, for packets of powder, for a stranger’s charming smile.

1. “Threw away” would imply that they would be aware of the consequence of their actions.
2. And 99.9% of the population wouldn’t agree to die in order to get drugs, money or sex.
3. Actually, people can be tempted to do x, y, or z.

The girl sexily beckons him so that means that she is a harlot. Because in Sue fiction, any girl who isn’t a Sue is a “friend” sycophant or an evil slut.

A.B. walks up to the girl and his skin is prickling. He realizes that up close “she wasn’t so perfect.”

Of course! Everyone knows that a Sue is the most beautiful woman in the universe!

Anime Boy sees that her mascara is smudged and she is sweaty.

He could smell her mortality, the sweet rot of corruption.

1. If I didn’t know any better, I would say the “corruption” is referring to original sin.
2. But since this girl is going to be demonized and be depicted as a nasty slut…
3. I’m going out on a limb and say that the “corruption” is a jab at Isabelle’s “whorish” ways.

Anime Boy thinks “Got you.”

A cool smile curled her lips.

This girl is a fisher of men!

The girl walks towards the storage room which is filled with “stacked boxes”and “tangled wiring.” Sexy.

Because when I think of having a one-night stand, I want the place to be a safety hazard.

So Anime Boy notices that nobody is looking at them.

So much the better if she wanted privacy.

1. Most people don’t want to have sex in the middle of a room filled with people.
2. Don’t know why A.B. even remarks about it.
3. Unless to further remind the reader that she’s a nasty slut.

He slipped into the room after her, unaware that he was being followed.

The perspective suddenly changes again and I got whiplash.

Clary and Simon are just standing around and they are staring at everyone. People are making out or gyrating to the music.

Simon tries to make small talk and like a good friend, Clary ignores him.

A boy with a lip piercing and a teddy bear backpack was handing out free tablets of herbal ecstasy, his parachute pants flapping in the breeze from the wind machine.

1. This is an all-ages club.
2. Which means there is Walmart approved music, no booze, and no drugs along with constant adult supervision.
3. Because if little Johnny or little Susie dies from an overdose or is hospitalized, the parents are going to sue the club owner.

Clary wasn’t paying much attention to their immediate surroundings—her eyes were on the blue-haired boy who’d talked his way into the club.

Clary would never be interested in a filthy peasant!

“I, for one,” Simon went on, “am enjoying myself immensely.”

“And I say old bean, the music is simply divine.”

Why in the hell is Simon talking like a clichéd English gentleman?

This seemed unlikely. Simon, as always, stuck out at the club like a sore thumb, in jeans and an old T-shirt that said made in Brooklyn across the front.

Translation: Simon is uncool and unworthy to stand before the Sue.

His freshly scrubbed hair was dark brown instead of green or pink, and his glasses perched crookedly on the end of his nose.

1. Hair isn’t “scrubbed”. It is washed.
2. You don’t scrub hair unless it is solid plastic like a Ken doll.
3. I wear glasses.
4. When your glasses are on the end of your nose, they can fall off and possibly break.
5. And having crooked glasses make it hard to see things.

So Simon looks like this:

He looked less as if he were contemplating the powers of darkness and more as if he were on his way to chess club.

1. Because everyone knows, only people wearing black cloaks and pentagram necklaces can think about Satanic forces!
2. Wait a tick…
3. I think Clare is trying to say that people at the club would be thinking about the powers of darkness.
4. But Mark Twain wisely said: “Say what he is proposing to say, not merely come near it."
5. People are either dancing, making out or doing drugs.
6. And Pandemonium IS NOT the place for dark contemplations.
7. Or ANY contemplations.
8. It has smoke machines, multi-colored lights, and trance music.
9. I’m starting to think this line came from one of Claire’s Harry Potter fanfics.

Clary ignores Simon. Isn’t she such a good friend?

Clary knew perfectly well that he came to Pandemonium with her only because she liked it, that he thought it was boring.

1. Why did Clary drag Simon to Pandemonium?
2. Good people don’t treat their friend like an accessory.
3. Clary should have gone to the club alone.

She wasn’t even sure why it was that she liked it— the clothes, the music made it like a dream, someone else’s life, not her boring real life at all.

Because Clary knows that she is not destined to have a mundane existence! After all, she is a Special Snowflake!

But she was always too shy to talk to anyone but Simon.

1. So they are not doing to be dancing, drinking or socializing with anyone else…
2. They plan on standing in one place for the entire time.
3. WHY?!?
4. For the love of God, enough with the boring and shy goody-two-shoes who NEVER have any fun and are always a paragon of virtue!

The blue-haired boy was making his way off the dance floor. He looked a little lost, as if he hadn’t found whom he was looking for.

"I am his one tru luv! Everyone knows that a guy loves a bland girl with a nasty personality!”

“Uh, Clary? You are talking aloud again.”

“Silence, peasant!”

Clary thinks about talking to him. But Designated Slut in a White Dress piques Anime Boy’s interest.

She is upset that A.B. is interested in D.S.W.D (Designated Slut in a White Dress.)

The girl was gorgeous, the kind of girl Clary would have liked to draw—

being brutally murdered.

A girl that is more attractive than the Sue is a bitch, a slut, or evil. And usually, all three.

tall and ribbon-slim, with a long spill of black hair.

1. “A long spill” of black hair…
2. So her hair is a long paint spill?
3. Cassandra Clare was trying to say that the girl has long flowing hair.
4. But Mark Twain wisely said: “Say what he is proposing to say, not merely come near it."

Even at this distance, Clary could see the red pendant around her throat.

1. According to this, pendants are decorative items that hang from a chain, cord, or beaded necklace.
2. But if it is around the girl’s throat, it would be called a choker.
3. Because a choker is a close fitting necklace wore around the neck.

It pulsed under the lights of the dance floor like a separate, disembodied heart.

How spooky!

"I feel,” Simon went on, “that this evening DJ Bat is doing a singularly exceptional job. Don’t you agree?”

Clary rolled her eyes and didn’t answer;

We find out that Simon hates trance music.

Her attention was on the girl in the white dress.

Clary is plotting to track the girl down and give her a Glasgow smile.

Through the darkness, smoke, and artificial fog, her pale dress shone out like a beacon.

1. Where do I even begin?
2. Did the girl put glow in the dark paint on her dress?
3. Because wearing a white dress doesn’t make someone glow like a “beacon."
4. Because if the club is so dark, then how is Clary able to everyone clearly?
5. Is it because she has night vision?
6. Does the Pandemonium club want to be sued?
7. Because teenagers that are drinking, dancing or doing drugs in a dark place filled with smoke and artificial fog is a recipe for disaster.

No wonder the blue-haired boy was following her as if he were under a spell, too distracted to notice anything else around him—even the two dark shapes hard on his heels, weaving after him through the crowd. Clary slowed her dancing and stared.

I don’t look through rainbow-colored glasses and immediately interpret any character interaction as being potentially queer.

But considering the following facts:

1. The girl (btw her name is Isabelle) is being depicted as an evil slut luring a man to his doom.
2. Isabelle is so beautiful that A.B. is "under a spell."
3. And Clary is gawking at her and is constantly thinking about how "gorgeous” Isabelle is.
4. When a woman says that another woman is attractive doesn’t make her automatically bi/gay/pan/or ply.
5. But when a woman is ignoring her male friend so she can stare at a beautiful woman and is constantly thinking about how alluring the other woman is…
6. She is DEFINITELY not heterosexual.

Clary stops looking at the anglerfish named Isabelle Lightwood and focuses on the shapes.

She realizes that they are tall boys wearing black clothes.

She couldn’t have said how she knew that they were following the other boy, but she did.

“Because her Sue senses are tingling!”

She could see it in the way they paced him, their careful watchfulness, the slinking grace of their movements.

They are practicing for their high school production of Andrew Lloyd Weber’s “Cats”.

A small flower of apprehension began to open inside her chest.

I’m getting horrific flashbacks of Maggie Stiefvater’s “leaky womb” metaphor.

“Meanwhile,” Simon added, “I wanted to tell you that lately I’ve been cross-dressing. Also, I’m sleeping with your mom. I thought you should know.”

1. Like another writer, Cassandra Cla[i]re thinks that she has a Wildean wit.
2. But in order to funny, the comment or the joke has to humorous and the person needs to have comedic timing.
3. Perhaps Cla[i]re would be actually funny if she wasn’t trying to be witty 24/7.

So Designated Slut in a White Dress “beckoned” Anime Boy and they enter the storage room.

It wasn’t anything Clary hadn’t seen before, a couple sneaking off to the dark corners of the club to make out—but that made it even weirder that they were being followed.

Apparently, Clary has never heard of voyeurs before.

So Clary stands on her tiptoes to see what’s going on.

The two guys stopped at the storage door and are talking to each other. One guy has black hair and one guy has blond hair.

The blond one reached into his jacket and drew out something long and sharp that flashed under the strobing lights. A knife.

1. I’m not a weapons expert but aren’t knives usually short?
2. Unless Jace is running all over New York City murdering demons with a carving knife.
3. And wouldn’t it be better to carry a smaller weapon?
4. A large or long weapon would be harder to conceal.

Clary freaks out and shouts Simon’s name. She also grabs him by the arm.

Simon says that he isn’t sleeping with Clary’s mom and he was just “trying to get your attention.”

“Do you see those guys?” She pointed wildly, almost hitting a curvy black girl who was dancing nearby.

1. “The guys who are ready to commit a homicide. Aren’t they so sexy?”
2. And I seriously wish I was joking about the killers being sexy.
3. Clary will blither on about how sexy Jace is even though he is a douchebag who has zero qualms about killing people.
4. It turns out that the “curvy black girl” is Maia Roberts.
5. Even though Clary and Maia don’t realize that they encountered each other at the Pandemonium club months before they are formally introduced.
6. And Maia is biracial.

The girl shot her an evil look.

How dare she! The Mary Sue is all-powerful! And she is more beautiful than Aphrodite!

Put the filthy peasant in the pillory!

Clary blurts out sorry twice and then asks Simon if he saw the two guys over by the storage room.

Simon replies that he doesn’t see anything. Clary explains that two guys were following Anime Boy.

The blond guy has a knife.

“Are you sure?” Simon stared harder, shaking his head. “I still don’t see anyone.”

“I’m sure.”

“As a Mary Sue, I am always right.”

Simon tells her to stay put. Then he leaves to get the security guards. Clary sees the two guys entering the storage room.

Simon is trying to make his way across the dance floor but he isn’t “making much progress.”

Even if she yelled now, no one would hear her, and by the time Simon got back, something terrible might already have happened. Biting hard on her lower lip, Clary started to wriggle through the crowd.

1. It’s official: Clary is a moron.
2. She is also the girl that gets brutally murdered in a horror film.
3. At least Simon has a brain. He is getting help and will allow the authorities to do their job.

“What’s your name?”

“It’s Ebony Dark'ness Dementia Raven Way.”

“Oh hell no.”

“Relax, I’m just fucking with you.”

What faint light there was in the storage room spilled down through high barred windows smeared with dirt. Piles of electrical cables, along with broken bits of mirrored disco balls and discarded paint cans littered the floor.

1. I’m surprised that the Pandemonium Club is still open.
2. It is unsafe and has zero adult supervision.

The girl smiles and says that her name is Isabelle. He replies that it is a nice name. A.B. walks towards her “carefully among the wires in case any of them were live.”

In the faint light she looked half-transparent, bleached of color, wrapped in white like an angel. It would be a pleasure to make her fall…

What’s next? Is Anime Boy going to cackle maniacally while he is kicking a puppy?

A. B. remarks that he hasn’t seen Isabelle before. She asks “You’re asking me if I come here often?”

Isabelle giggles and then Anime Boy notices something.

There was some sort of bracelet around her wrist, just under the cuff of her dress—then, as he neared her, he saw that it wasn’t a bracelet at all but a pattern inked into her skin, a matrix of swirling lines.

1. A “matrix”?
2. According to Merriam Webster, a matrix either a rectangular mathematical array, a mold for an item or something within or from which something is developed.
3. It is NOT a pattern.

He is shocked and Isabelle hits him in the chest. Anime Boy staggers back and sees that Isabelle is holding something in her hand.

A coiling whip that glinted gold as she brought it down, curling around his ankles, jerking him off his feet.

1. Metals such as gold or silver make terrible armor or weapons.
2. There is a reason why blacksmiths and bladesmiths use steel to forge items.
3. And a whip is a terrible weapon.

Anime Boy hits the ground and he is writhing in pain. Isabelle is laughing as she is standing over him.

A.B. thinks that “he should have known.”

No human girl would wear a dress like the one Isabelle wore.

Because ALL women wear the same exact clothing.

She’d worn it to cover her skin—all of her skin.

1. Apparently, the demon has never heard of burqas.
2. And why can’t Isabelle use makeup to cover up the runes?

Her smile glittered like poisonous water.

1. Adding poison in the water is not going to make it shimmer like a sparklepire.
2. And for that is holy and good, enough with the annoying similies!

The demon is thrown against the wall and his hands are bound with wire.

As he struggled, someone walked around the side of the pillar into his view: a boy, as young as Isabelle and just as pretty.

1. Because when someone is going to be brutally murdered, they are going to be ogling their murderer.
2. I love it how Clare puts the emphasis on the boy being attractive and young.
3. Because after all, beauty trumps a great personality and being a good person.
4. And there is that awkward moment when you realize there are more unintentional queer characters than canon LGBT+ characters in The Shadowhunter Chronicles…

It turns out that the boy also has golden eyes.

So the golden-eyed psychopath designated love interest for the Mary Sue asks the blue haired demon if there are any more demons.

But the demon plays dumb.

“Come on now.” The tawny-eyed boy held up his hands, and his dark sleeves slipped down, showing the runes inked all over his wrists, the backs of his hands, his palms. “You know what I am.”

“I am a sparklepire.”

Far back inside his skull, the shackled boy’s second set of teeth began to grind.

So demon boy is like Claire Densmore from Miss Peregrine’s Home For Peculiar Children?

“Shadowhunter,” he hissed.

“And it is NOTHING like a Dark Hunter.”

The douchebag with the golden eyes grins and says “got you.”

The perspective changes for the THIRD time. So Clary has finally entered the room. Which it doesn’t make any sense.

Because Clary should have already arrived at the storage room unless she trips over air molecules like Bella Swan.

Clary looks around and doesn’t see anyone. We get some more descriptions of the storage room.

There’s no one in here, she realized, looking around in bewilderment.

1. Maybe it’s because you only imagined it.
2. But silly me.
3. The Mary Sue is infallible like the Pope.

It was cold in the room, despite the August heat outside. Her back was icy with sweat.

So the storage room is air conditioned but the club is not? That makes perfect sense.

She took a step forward, tangling her feet in electrical wires.

I am astonished that NO ONE has sued Pandemonium. Having electrical wires all over the floor is a tripping hazard.

Clary removes her foot from the wires.

And faster than you can say “plot convenience”, Clary suddenly sees and hears three people along with the demon.

There was the girl in her long white dress, her black hair hanging down her back like damp seaweed.

Enough with the weird similes!

Cassandra Clare reminds us that the blue-haired boy is still tied to a pillar along with Alec having black hair and Jace having blond hair.

Of course, Jace is being described as “fair” and how his hair “gleamed like brass in the dim light”.

We get it, Clare. You think Jace is a studmuffin. Stop telling us every five seconds.

Clary hides behind the nearest pillar and peers around it.

Now that I’m thinking about it… Why didn’t any of the Shadowhunters notice Clary?

Unless Clary can walk lightly like Legolas, someone should have heard Clary entering the room. Or at the very least, hearing the door open and close.

But I’m putting way more thought into this than Cassandra Clare.

Jace is pacing back and forth with folded arms. He remarks that “You still haven’t told me if there are any other of your kind with you.”

And because Clary has the I.Q. of Bella Swan, she thinks this is a “gang war”.The blue haired demon says that he has no idea what Jace is talking about.

“He means other demons,” said the dark-haired boy, speaking for the first time. “You do know what a demon is, don’t you?”

“Alec, why are we talking about things that we already know about?”

“Because if we didn’t, the reader wouldn’t know anything.”

And then it happens…

“Demons,” drawled the blond boy, tracing the word on the air with his finger. “Religiously defined as hell’s denizens, the servants of Satan, but understood here, for the purposes of the Clave, to be any malevolent spirit whose origin is outside our own home dimension—”

Isabelle and Alec tell Jace to stop giving info dumps.

They’re crazy, Clary thought. Actually crazy.

And they were created by a terrible writer.

Jace raised his head and smiled. There was something fierce about the gesture, something that reminded Clary of documentaries she’d watched about lions on the Discovery Channel, the way the big cats would raise their heads and sniff the air for prey.

In a pride, lionesses are the primary hunters. And the lions protect their territory.

“Isabelle and Alec think I talk too much,” he said, confidingly. “Do you think I talk too much?”

YES!! Now just:

The blue-haired boy didn’t reply. His mouth was still working. “I could give you information,” he said. “I know where Valentine is.”

Unfortunately, no.

Valentine is more like this:

Oops! I meant this!

It is not like The Thin White Duke and Valentine Morgenstern are both impeccably dressed fascists with slicked back hair…

The Shadow-Nazis are convinced that the demon is lying and want to kill “it”because Valentine is allegedly dead.

And why are Sauron, Sephiroth, and Voldemort chuckling?

Jace raised his hand, and Clary saw dim light spark off the knife he was holding. It was oddly translucent, the blade clear as crystal, sharp as a shard of glass, the hilt set with red stones.

1. If an item is translucent…
2. Then it is crystal clear.

The demon insists that Valentine is alive and everyone in the “Infernal Worlds knows it.” He then offers to tell Jace where Valentine is.

Rage flared suddenly in Jace’s icy eyes.

“By the Angel, every time we capture one of you bastards, you claim you know where Valentine is. Well, we know where he is too. He’s in hell. And you—” Jace turned the knife in his grasp, the edge sparking like a line of fire. “You can join him there.”

1. Let’s see…
2. Conjurers and magic exist in this world along with a grimoire containing black magic.
3. So it is possible to resurrect people.
4. And if ALL of the demons are saying that Valentine is alive…
5. It should be something worth investigating especially if Duke Valentine is supposed to be the epitome of evil.
6. Also, the only reason why the Shadow-Nazis are convinced that Duke Valentine is dead…
7. Because they found a corpse burnt to a crisp.
8. In conclusion:

“Stop!” she cried. “You can’t do this.”

This line is cringe-worthy like: “'Sorry,’ apologized Brom.”

Jace whirled, so startled that the knife flew from his hand and clattered against the concrete floor.

1. Jace Wayland is supposed to be the best Shadowhunter of his generation…
2. A badass who vanquishes evil and makes demons cry…
3. Is startled by a teenage girl and drops his weapon.
4. Jace is a wimp like Edward Cullen.

Isabelle, Alec, and the blue-haired demon are all shocked with their mouths wide open.

I’d like to think that the demon is astonished that Jace is such a twit.

Alec is the one to break the silence.

“What’s this?” he demanded, looking from Clary to his companions, as if they might know what she was doing there.

Sorry, I couldn’t resist.

And why is Alec talking about Clary like she is an item?

“It’s a girl,” Jace said, recovering his composure. “Surely you’ve seen girls before, Alec. Your sister Isabelle is one.”

1. “Because being gay is so hilarious!”
2. Aside from the incredible disgusting “he’s gay" gag, there is even more crappy exposition.

He took a step closer to Clary, squinting as if he couldn’t quite believe what he was seeing.

Maybe it is time for Jace to start wearing some fucking glasses.

“A mundie girl,” he said, half to himself. “And she can see us.”

And in other news, the Pope is Catholic and water is wet.

Clary replies that she can see him and that she is “not blind.”

And for some strange reason, Jace insists that she is and tells her to scram.

Clary refuses to leave because if she did, then Jace would kill the blue-haired boy.

He nonchalantly replies “That’s true,” and twirls a knife.

Jace then asks why she cares about the blue-haired boy.

“Be-because—,” Clary spluttered. “You can’t just go around killing people.”

1. You mean homicide is wrong???
2. Thanks for letting me know, Cassandra Clare!

“You’re right,” said Jace. “You can’t go around killing people.”

“And by people, I mean Shadow-Nazis. Everyone else is inferior beings.”

He pointed at the boy with blue hair, whose eyes were slitted. Clary wondered if he’d fainted.

1. According to Clary, someone with “slitted” eyes means that they have fainted…
2. But someone with slitted pupils is normal and NOT unusual…

For once, I’d like to see a heroine in a YA novel have a brain.

“That’s not a person, little girl. It may look like a person and talk like a person and maybe even bleed like a person. But it’s a monster.”

1. Yes, I know the blue-haired is an unholy abomination that must be vanquished.
2. But Shadow-Nazis treat everyone else like shit stuck on the bottom of their shoes.
3. And somewhere, fascist assholes just gave Jace a standing ovation…

Isabelle tells Jace to shut the fuck up. Well, not those exact words.

Clary says that Jace is crazy and that she has called the police.

Alec says that she is “lying.” And why isn’t he talking to Clary directly?

At that moment the blue-haired boy, with a high, yowling cry, tore free of the restraints binding him to the pillar, and flung himself on Jace.

Which begs the following questions:

1. Why didn’t he escape a while ago?
2. Does he enjoy listening to shitty exposition and being surrounded by fascists assholes?
3. Or is it because he had nothing better to do?
4. And why is he suddenly able to get free? It was hurting him and restricted his movement.

Jace and the demon start fighting.

Since Clary is the girl who would be murdered in a horror movie, she trips over the wiring and stares at the fight.

Instead of fleeing like what a smart person would do.

Isabelle is “shrieking” and the demon is now sitting on Jace’s chest.

Blood gleamed at the tips of his razorlike claws.

1. I know that I’m expected to care about Jace.
2. But he’s a douchebag so I don’t care.
3. And why didn’t the demon leave the room while everyone was distracted?

Isabelle and Alec were running toward them, Isabelle brandishing a whip in her hand.

1. What is Alec going to do?
2. He isn’t described as having a weapon in his hand.
3. And he never fights the demon.
4. Seriously, why is Alec here in the first place?
5. The only thing Alec has accomplished is being slightly more misogynistic than Jace.

The fight scene is weird. Jace used his arm as a shield when the demon attacks him.

Before you ask, the demon doesn’t attack Jace with his knife.

The demon uses his claws because his weapon has disappeared without a trace. Also, why doesn’t the demon aim for Jace’s guts or legs?

The demon lunges at Jace again and Isabelle hits it in the back. The demon then shrieked.

Jace rolls to the side.

There was a blade gleaming in his hand.

1. Where did this weapon come from?!?
2. Jace dropped his knife when he was startled by Clary.
3. And Clare didn’t say that he picked up the knife.
4. So I’m going to assume that he grabbed a knife from Hammerspace.

Jace stabs the demon in the chest and black blood is squirting all over the place. He stands up as the demon is writhing on the floor.

Jace yanks the knife out and the demon hissed.

“So be it. The Forsaken will take you all.”

1. This isn’t surprising…
2. Because Cassandra Clare isn’t renowned for her originality.

Jace seemed to snarl.

1. He either snarled or he didn’t.
2. Which is it?

The demon dies and his corpse vanished.

Because heaven forbid our so-called heroes having to put some elbow grease in disposing of a body.

Clary tries to flee but Isabelle flicks her whip and wraps around Clary’s wrist.

“Stupid little mundie,” Isabelle said between her teeth. “You could have gotten Jace killed.”

1. Yeah, Clary is a dumbass.
2. But she wasn’t the one that put Jace’s life in danger.
3. It was Jace’s own stupidity that almost cost him his life.
4. Who freaked out by dropping his weapon after seeing a teenage girl? Jace!
5. Who was the twit who never picked it up? Jace!
6. Who thinks that he is God’s gift to womankind and is a misogynistic and bigoted douchebag? Jace!
7. I’m sensing a pattern…

“He’s crazy,” Clary said, trying to pull her wrist back. The whip bit deeper into her skin. “You’re all crazy. What do you think you are, vigilante killers? The police”

Somebody open up a window! Because the room is reeking of stupidity!

Clary has only:

1. Heard a guy using terminology that the “crazy” people know.
2. Had seen him tear through piano wire with razor-sharp claws.
3. Witnessed the same dude attacking people and bleeding black blood.
4. And once the guy died, she saw him vanishing.

And despite witnessing everything, Clary is insisting that NOTHING supernatural has transpired.

In conclusion? Clary has the IQ of Bella Swan.

Jace points out that the police won’t believe her because they won’t be able to find a corpse.

Alec is scowling and he is following Jace.

“They return to their home dimensions when they die,” said Jace. “In case you were wondering.”

And no, we will not get an explanation why this happens.

Alec is pissed off and tells Jace to “be careful.”

Jace’s face is covered with blood but Clary is thinking that he looks like “a lion with his wide-spaced, light-colored eyes, and that tawny gold hair.”

It is good to know that our female protagonist has her priorities straight.

“She can see us, Alec,” he said.

Jace then says that Clary “knows too much.” Jace tells Isabelle to let Clary go.

Isabelle isn’t thrilled with Jace’s order but “didn’t argue.”

Alec suggests that they take Clary with them because some guy named Hodge would want to talk to her.

Isabelle says this is a terrible idea because “She’s a mundie.”

“Or is she?” said Jace softly. His quiet tone was worse than Isabelle’s snapping or Alec’s anger. “Have you had dealings with demons, little girl? Walked with warlocks, talked with the Night Children? Have you-”

1. “Little girl”? FUCK YOU JACE!
2. “Walked with warlocks” and “Talked with the Night Children” sounds awfully familiar…
3. And if Clary DID mingle with supernatural entities, then she wouldn’t be shocked by seeing a demon.
4. Jace, you are a dumbass.

Clary has no idea what Jace is talking about and tells him tells not to call her “little girl.”

Also, a light bulb finally went off in Clary’s head.

Before her inner goddess can dance, Simon and the bouncer show up.

He asks if Clary is okay and where are the guys with the knives.

Of course, Jace smirks at Clary.

Clearly he wasn’t surprised that neither Simon nor the bouncer could see them.

If Jace was, then he wouldn’t be acting like a smug douchebag.

Somehow neither was Clary.

1. Only a second ago, Clary didn’t believe in anything supernatural.
2. But now she ISN’T surprised that Simon and the bouncer are unable to see the Shadow-Nazis…
3. Or is this C. Clare’s subtle way of telling us that Clary is destined for greatness and not a filthy peasant?

Clary tells them that she didn’t see any guys with knives. Isabelle is giggling while the bouncer is annoyed.

“I don’t believe it,” Simon said stubbornly as Clary, standing at the curb, tried desperately to hail a cab.

1. Why is Simon convinced that Clary is lying?
2. Earlier, he was skeptical of her claims.

They are trying to hail a cab.

Clary claims that she only imagined the whole thing but Simon refuses to drop the subject.

Clary thought of Jace with his lion-cat eyes.

1. Instead of how he is an unrepentant murderer and douchebag.
2. Fuck this book with a rusty screwdriver!

She glanced down at her wrist, braceleted by a thin red line where Isabelle’s whip had curled.No, not a ghost, she thought. Something even weirder than that.

1. Clary has proof that she isn’t insane but she won’t tell her friend.
2. And yes, claiming to see invisible people killing a demon sounds crazy…
3. But we later find out that Simon is the sort of person would believe that the world is being controlled by the Elder Gods.

Clary assures him that “It was just a mistake.” Then she is thinking about everything that happened.

“Well, it was a hell of an embarrassing mistake,” Simon said. He glanced back at the club, where a thin line still snaked out the door and halfway down the block. “I doubt they’ll ever let us back into Pandemonium.”

“What do you care? You hate Pandemonium.”

Maybe he is upset that you won’t be able to return to Pandemonium, you superficial bitch!

So a taxi finally arrives. Simon opens the door for Clary and she gets inside.

He tells the cab driver to take them to Brooklyn.

“Look, you know you can tell me anything, right?”

Clary hesitated a moment, then nodded. “Sure, Simon,” she said. “I know I can.”

“Did you know that demon killing Nazi makes me horny?”

“What the fuck is wrong with you, Clary?!”