CBR2 Books 76-78: "The Mortal Instruments trilogy" by Cassandra Clare

Book 1: City of Bones - 4 stars
Book 2: City of Ashes - 4 stars
Book 3: City of Glass - 3.5 stars

Publisher: McElderry
Total page count: 1584 pages
Date begun: August 20th, 2010
Date finished: August 25th, 2010

WARNING! CONTAINS SPOILERS!

Clarissa "Clary" Fray's life changes one evening when she and her best friend Simon are at a night club, and she sees three mysteriously tattooed teenagers killing another teen, who then disappears right in front of her eyes. She finds out that the three are Shadowhunters, they keep the world safe from demons, and Clary, a mundane, should not have been able to see them or the demon boy they killed. Simon did not see a thing, and wonders why she is acting so strangely. Not long after the incident in the night club, Clary's mother Joscelyn disappears, and it becomes clear that demons took her. Clary manages to kill one of the demons, and Jace, one of the Shadowhunter boys, is very curious as to how a seemingly normal human can do all these things.

Of course Clary is not as normal as she first seemed, and she discovers that her mother was in fact a Shadowhunter, and that the reason she was abducted is because she is the only one who knows the whereabouts of the Mortal Cup, a mystical artifact that is needed to create more Shadowhunters. Valentine, a crazy and dangerous Shadowhunter, believed killed in an epic battle many years before, is apparently very much alive and he wants the Mortal Cup to create his own army of Shadowhunters, so he can rid the world of all Downworlders (werewolves, vampires, warlocks and fairies). Clary needs to figure out why she has a massive mental block in her head, and discover a way to rescue her mother from Valentine.

In City of Ashes, Clary has discovered the identity of her father, and the existence of a brother. She has rescued her mother from Valentine, but Joscelyn is still in a deep coma. Clary is living with Luke, an old friend of her mother's, former Shadowhunter and leader of the local werewolf pack. Jace is under suspicion by the Shadowhunter Inquisitor and mistrusted by his foster parents since Valentine has been revealed to be his father. Valentine needs to get the Soul-Sword, the second of the Mortal Instruments, and he also needs the blood of four Downworlder children to turn it into a weapon only he controls. He wants Jace to join him in his purification of the Shadowhunters, and is not well pleased when Jace refuses. Clary tries to fight her feelings for Jace and seeing if she can return Simon's feelings, but after an unfortunate incident in the court of the Queen of the Fairies, it becomes obvious to everyone that Clary only really loves Jace, and Simon runs off and does something rather stupid as a result. When he and one of the young werewolves in Luke's pack get captured by Valentine, Clary has no choice but to risk her life once again to save her friends.

In City of Glass, Clary needs to go to the main Shadowhunter city, Alicante, to see a warlock in order to wake her mother from her coma. Jace doesn't want her to come with him and the Lightwoods, as he is afraid of what the Shadowhunter ruling council will do when they discover Clary's unusual powers. He asks Simon for help to keep Clary in New York, but the Institute is attacked, and Jace is forced to drag Simon through the portal to Alicante to prevent him from being killed. Clary is furious when she realizes the Lightwoods left without her, and manages to open her own portal. Luke follows her, trying to protect her.

Once in Alicante, Clary stays with Luke's sister, and tries to find the spell that can rescue her mother. She doesn't know that Simon is in the city, and has been put in prison by the new Inquisitor, believed to be an ally of Valentine's. Jace is not happy to see her, and she is not happy to see Jace kissing another girl. She makes the acquaintance of a young, handsome Shadowhunter named Sebastian Verlac, who offers to help her, but it turns out to be Jace who can help her find the spell book she needs to wake Joscelyn. In the basement of the estate where Valentine raised Jace, they discover Valentine's abandoned library, and realize the extent of the experiments he performed. On the way back to Alicante, they realize that the city is in flames, Valentine has managed to break the seals of protection, and demons are swarming all over the place. Now they have to stop him from summoning the angel Raziel out of the lake outside Alicante, and ending life as they know it.

The Mortal Instruments trilogy is very entertaining and I'm sorry I waited to so long to read them (mainly put off by the Stephenie Meyer quote on the cover). I guess I was afraid they'd be just another Twilight ripoff. They're not. The trilogy reminds me more of Buffy the Vampire Slayer crossed with Star Wars than anything else, with impossible love affairs, love triangles, a myriad of supernatural creatures, wise-cracking teenage heroes and heroines, evil parents, long-lost siblings, unrequited crushes and the like. Much of the plot is quite cliched, but still greatly enjoyable, and I was very eager to reach the conclusion and see if everything ended the way I wanted it to. Apparently Cassandra Clare started out writing fan fiction, and if you've read some of it, these books are rather derivative. I'm glad to say that as someone unfamiliar with her fan fic, these books were an entirely new experience for me, and I will probably be reading both the prequel trilogy she is writing about the Shadowhunters, and the sequel trilogy, where City of Fallen Angels is set to come out in April 2011.

CBR2 Book 75: "The Sleeping Beauty" by Mercedes Lackey

Publisher: Luna Books
Page count: 352 pages
Rating: 4 stars
Date begun: August 16th, 2010
Date finished: August 18th, 2010

Lily is fairy Godmother to the kingdom of Eltaria. The kingdom needs to be carefully watched, and Lily's job as Godmother is to make sure the Tradition goes in the favour of the rulers and inhabitants of the country. The Tradition is a force that pretty much takes any situation and tries to turn it into a fairy tale or folk tale direction - not necessarily one with a happy ending. Eltaria is a very rich kingdom, with many bordering kingdoms who would like nothing better than to conquer it and take control of those riches. Princess Rosamund is without a doubt the fairest in all the land, her mother was a shepherdess who married the king, and as a result, the princess has learned a number of useful life skills most princess might not be in possession of.

Now her lovely mother is dead, however, and Tradition is trying to get the king to marry a sorceress so princess Rose gets an evil stepmother. Lily poses as a sorceress and pretends to marry to the king, calming Tradition for the moment, but soon the king dies in battle, the princess is an orphan, and before Lily can react, an evil huntsman has chased Rose into the woods, where she is found by seven very unpleasant dwarves and forced to be their kitchen slave. Lily manages to rescue Rose and trick Tradition again by causing her to fall heavily asleep with a potion. Two princes arrive, both wanting to kiss Rosamund awake, but Lily wants the princess to be able to choose her own husband, and makes sure she's the one who wakes the princess. Now Lily just needs to figure out a way to secure that Rosamund can find true love, and that Eltaria is safe from outside invasion for the foreseeable future, without the Tradition interfering too much.

Mercedes Lackey's 500 Kingdoms novels are a fun concept, taking various well-known fairy tales and turning them into something new and different. There are traces of Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, the Rings of the Nibelungen and a number of other traditional stories in The Sleeping Beauty, and at the same time, it's entirely its own story. Rose is not an insipid and stupid princess, she is resourceful and clever and helps Lily as best she can with sorting out the mess her kingdom is in.

Both the main princes, Siegfried and Leopold, are charming and good potential husbands for princess. Siegfried is trying to fight Tradition as well, as he is meant to rescue one of his many aunts from a burning circle and marry her, thus also bringing about his own doom. Naturally, he does not really want to do this, but Tradition is becoming more insistent and he keeps finding sleeping armored maidens in burning circles all over the place. Having slain a dragon at an early age, and drunk a drop of its blood, he can talk to animals, and with the help of a little bird, he does his best to find a different fate.

The Sleeping Beauty is the third of Lackey's 500 Kingdoms-novels that I've read, and I will absolutely be checking out more of them, if she keeps writing as well as she has so far.

CBR2 Book 74: "Fire" by Kristin Cashore

Publisher: Gollancz
Page count: 400 pages
Rating: 4.5 stars
Date begun: August 14th, 2010
Date finished: August 16th, 2010

Fire lives in the kingdom of the Dells. As well as normal animals, the Dells is populated by jewel-coloured monsters that are so beautiful that they can mesmerize their prey. Fire is a human monster, she has to keep her flaming locks covered at all times, both because she is the favoured pray of all the carnivorous monsters, and because she doesn't like the way humans get rendered helpless around her. She has the ability to get into the heads of humans and influence them to do her bidding.

Her father was the chief "advisor" to the old king, but in reality controlled him like a puppet. Her father loved his power over people, and only showed real affection and occasional kindness to his only daughter. However, he caused the King to act very rashly, and drove the kingdom towards instability, so Fire is determined to be as unlike him as possible. She lives on a small estate far away from the capital, teaches everyone around her to put up mental shields to protect them from mental manipulation. She teaches music to children, and tries to stay out of trouble. But soon mysterious hunters come to her home, and then get killed before they can be questioned.

The young king, Nash, and his brother Brigan, who acts as his military commander, are struggling to keep control in the kingdom, there are forces both to the south and the north who want nothing more than to take power. They need Fire's help, but Brigan especially is very suspicious of her powers and suffered terribly while her father was alive. He would like nothing better than for her to die, but is forced to set aside his misgivings to help his brother secure the throne and peace in the kingdom.

Kristin Cashore's previous book, Graceling was a very original and interesting fantasy novel. Fire is a prequel of sorts, set in a country neighbouring the one in Graceling. It is actually even better than Cashore's debut, and that is great praise indeed. Fire is a fascinating heroine, who has great powers but is deeply reluctant to use them due to the heartless and irresponsible behaviour of her father. From an early age, she saw how her powers could be abused if she was not careful, but having been mostly raised by the former king's crippled military advisor, she has learned goodness, loyalty and responsibility, but is not confident that this can counteract her monster instincts. She understands why the king's sons are both sceptical about her, and wants nothing more than to prove herself useful to them, to atone for the sins of her father.

Fire is set in a fascinating world, and all the characters are complex and wounded in their ways. There is adventure, and suspense, and political intrigue, but Fire's personal growth makes up the core of the novel, and is fascinating to read about. I could barely put the book down, and can't wait for Cashore's next novel.

My wonderful recent book haul

I'm another year older, and as always, my wish list consisted mostly of books. Not that most of my friends seemed to have read most of it - or if they had, they had certainly not checked with each other what they planned on getting me. At my party, I ended up with not one, but two complete sets of Cassandra Clare's Mortal Instruments trilogy, as well as a third copy of book 3: City of Glass (am working on a review of the trilogy now, and this will appear in due time). I also received two copies of Lucifer 11: Evensong, just to increase the number of duplicates.

Still, lots of duplicate books means going to swap them, and there are two extremely well stocked fantasy book stores in the Oslo city centre now. Taking four books and a trade paperback in, I emerged a short while later with six new books and a different trade paperback. The same day as I decided to go book-swapping, a number of parcels from the Book Depository also arrived, increasing my collection further. I also had to go back today to purchase an additional couple.

So in the last week, my book collection has increased with 17 books - such a happy thing.
Comics:

• Lucifer 11: Evensong
• Unwritten 2: Inside Man - both by Mike Carey
• Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life
• Scott Pilgrim vs. the World - both by Brian Lee O'Malley
  

Books:

• City of Bones
  
• City of Ashes
• City of Bones - all by Cassandra Clare
• The Ruby in the Smoke
• The Shadow in the North
• The Tiger in the Well
• The Tin Princess - all by Philip Pullman
• Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins
• Galilee by Clive Barker
• Storm Born by Richelle Mead
• Rosemary and Rue by Seanan McGuire
• Blameless by Gail Carriger
• I Shall Wear Midnight by Terry Pratchett

Few things make me happier than new books. I shall try to force myself to actually review the books I have completed in the last month as well, so there's some updates on this blog soon.

CBR2 Book 73: "Last Night's Scandal" by Loretta Chase

Publisher: Avon
Page count: 384 pages
Rating: 4 stars
Date begun: August 4th, 2010
Date finished: August 4th, 2010

The hero and heroine of Last Night's Scandal first met when she was 12 and he was 14, in Loretta Chase's Lord Perfect. Ten years have passed, and Peregrine Dalmay, Earl of Lisle, has spent as much time as possible in Egypt, excavating and discovering with Rupert and Daphne Carsington (from Mr. Impossible). Now he is back in London, and his melodramatic and over-emotional parents want him to go to Scotland to restore a family property that is rumoured to be haunted. Just the thought of the dark, dank climate of Scotland fills Lisle with dread, and he has no intention of going along with their plans - he just wants to return to Egypt as soon as possible.

Miss Olivia Carsington is one of the richest girls in London, and a favoured gossip topic as she constantly seems to be doing something dramatic and has broken countless engagements. She has faithfully corresponded with Lisle for the past decade, and is delighted to see him home again, but knows that Egypt comes first in his heart, and she needs to help him outwit his parents and return there. Extremely independent and adventurous, she knows that soon she will have to settle for being some lord's wife, and all the grand adventures and quests she dreamed of as a young girl will be beyond her. She comes up with a grand scheme to put Lisle back in his parents' good graces (they threaten to cut him off entirely) and have one last adventure before she must accept the strictures of society.

With two old widows for chaperons, a small army of servants, Olivia and Lisle go to Scotland to see if they can't restore the ruined castle, get to the bottom of the hauntings, and possibly find the buried family treasure. In the five years that passed since Olivia and Lisle last met, they have both changed, and Lisle is especially shocked to realize that the freckled redhead who beat him over the head with his sketchbook the first time they met is now a stunning beauty with a very appealing figure. Despite being pretty much opposites when it comes to personality, the two old friends find themselves very attracted to each other, and try as best they can to fight the sexual tension, while bickering and sparring and nearly driving each other mad.

Loretta Chase's previous novel, Don't Tempt Me, was a great disappointment to me. She is probably my favourite romance author of all time, only rivalled by Julia Quinn, and hence my expectations to her books are very high. Last year's novel did not in any way live up to them. So when I heard that she was returning to characters I had first read about and loved in Lord Perfect, I was very excited, and I'm relieved that this book was a lot more like her other classics.

Having mentally gone through my list of her novels, this is probably my sixth favourite, but that is only because she has written some truly amazing books before - compared to almost any other romance novelist, this is an amazing book. The book is funny, and seeing how the children she first depicted have grown into adults is very rewarding. Both characters know each other so well, and love each other as friends, but also exasperate each other deeply. To see the friendship develop into romantic love is great.

CBR2 Book 72: "Eternal Kiss of Darkness" by Jeaniene Frost

Publisher: Avon
Page count: 384 pages
Rating: 3.5 stars
Date begun: August 3rd, 2010
Date finished: August 4th, 2010

Mencheres is an ancient Master Vampire, and "older than dirt". He is actually older than several of the pyramids, and while he once held amazing powers, like visions of the future, telekinesis and the ability to track people all over the globe, he now sees only darkness when he tries to see the future, and most of his powers seem to be fading. As he is millennia old, he is pretty much determined to meet his death soon.

Kira is a private detective, whose mentor taught her that her goal in life should be to "save one life". When walking home from a stakeout early one morning, she hears a commotion, and runs to see if she can help. She sees Mencheres being tortured by five ghouls, and they nearly kill her. Mencheres is touched that a human would risk her life to save a stranger, and saves her with his super powerful blood. Unfortunately, he is unable to use his vampire mesmerising powers on her afterwards to make her forget, she appears to be immune to them. While keeping Kira captive, worried that she will tell the police about the strange new supernatural world she has discovered, he grows more and more fascinated by her.

Kira, who is at first scared and confused by all the new things she is discovering, has always had very strong instincts, and fairly quickly starts trusting Mencheres, reasoning that he could just have killed her right away if he wanted to. He uses some of his blood to help her chronically ill sister, and when he lets her go, she is unable to forget him. This leads her to a vampire strip club where Mencheres' oldest enemy manages to set things up so that Kira will almost certainly be killed. Mencheres has no choice but to turn her into a vampire.

Mencheres' enemy soon has him framed for arson, multiple murders and worst of all from a vampire point of view - of leaking a video showing the existence of vampires on YouTube. Kira and Mencheres have to prove his innocence to the rather old-fashioned and extremely conservative council of Law Guardians, which is not easy considering his nemesis is a Law Guardian too. But Kira has had experience with dirty cops before, and refuses to let Mencheres sacrifice himself for her and die just because he's convinced his lack of visions is a sign he is nearing the end of his long existence.

While not as good as First Drop of Crimson, Eternal Kiss of Darkness was still a fairly entertaining read. Of all of Frost's novels, I would put it somewhere in the middle. There was a bit too much of Mencheres' self-pitying "I'm so ancient and some of my powers are gone and I may as well just curl up and die". Towards the beginning of the book, it also got a bit tedious that Kira was the only one for millennia who dared to interrupt him, or shush him, or generally stand up to him, just because she didn't realize how old, and rich and super powerful he was.

Kira was a very good heroine, though. Smart, strong, independent and no beating around the bush accepting her attraction, and later love for, Mencheres. Refusing to suffer his self-pity, and also being very understanding, but not overly judgemental when he tells her about the many terrible things he's done in his looong life as a vampire. She adores her sick sister, is kind to her dead-beat brother and adapts to a scary and fairly shitty situation in a very admirable way. She is absolutely what saved this book from being a bit long-winded in places.

CBR2 Book 71: "Mistress of the Art of Death" by Ariana Franklin

Publisher: Bantam Books
Page count: 512 pages
Rating: 4 stars
Date begun: July 22nd, 2010
Date finished: July 25th, 2010

Someone is killing children in 12th Century Cambridge, and the Jews are being blamed for it. Since the Jews are forced to hide in the sheriff's fortress, Henry II can't tax them, and is losing a lot of much needed revenue. He also has to deal carefully with the Church, after that unfortunate incident where his Archbishop, Thomas Becket, got brutally murdered by some knights who misunderstood the king's wishes. Adelia, a Mistress in the Art of Death (a Medieval pathologist, basically) is sent to Cambridge with her eunuch manservant, Mansur, and one of the chief agents of the King of Sicily, Simon of Naples.

As women are not allowed to practice medicine in England, and they are afraid she may be accused of witchcraft, Adelia poses as Mansur's assistant. He only speaks Arabic in front of the patients, and she "translates" the doctor's orders and carries them out. With the help of the local prior, who Adelia saves during their journey, the little band of investigators are housed safely in Cambridge, given a capable housekeeper, and Adelia is given access to the bodies of the dead children. It quickly becomes clear to Adelia and Simon that the murderer's most likely a Crusader, and the local tax collector is both a former crusading knight and very interested in the case and Adelia's findings.

Mistress in the Art of Death is a very entertaining read, with a fascinating cast of characters. The author freely admits that some things in the book are anachronistic. Adelia is a stubborn, fiercely intelligent and prickly heroine. She feels out of place with most women, and is loathe to suffer the foolishness of people in general. Simon of Naples is a much more patient and pleasant man, who has realized that by appearing gentle and a bit simple one can find out a great many things, and being met unassuming and non-threatening, but very good listener, most people will spill their secrets unwittingly.

The book's tension builds gradually. The various suspects are presented fairly early on, but there are enough twists and turns to keep the reader guessing. The author manages to present a lot of history while still writing a compelling murder mystery. While the book started a bit slowly, it did not take long before I had trouble putting it down.