Next Third of City of Bones
Okay, so apparently I bitch enough about this book that I need to cut its review into 3 pieces for fear of them getting too long. So here's my thoughts on the middle third of City of Bones. It's my running commentary to Lyndsey as I was reading, and I warn you, it's a touch on the long side, but hopefully entertaining enough.
Something I didn't mention in my last review is that the book starts with a Shakespeare quote, then there's immediately another quote to start part 1, this time from Paradise Lost by John Milton. My comment to Lyndsey about this was that I found it horribly pretentious and unneccessary, and now, having actually read part one, I can say that while I see how the Shakespeare quote fits, the Milton one seems horribly out of place and simply is there to say "Look at me! I've read Paradise Lost. I'm smart." I'm mentioning this now because my first comment is a follow up to that.
•So the quote for the beginning of part 2? It's not even in english. Seriously, are we seeing how this is pretentious yet?
•Yet another lovely personality trait of Clary's: drops something. blames the loss of it on someone else.
And now Jace is telling a meta story about a boy training a bird. Shoot me.
•It's a "look at how broken I am. love me" story.
•Also, the scene was about Clary not being able to sleep, and then Jace tells her a story and suddenly she's so exhausted that she just fucking passes out like she was drugged.
•And also, she likes to bring up her orange bedroom walls because she's fun and quirky, while she disparages the other girl's choices because obviously the other girl is horrible, and Clary is the only worthwhile female. And now she's getting a makeover so she's hot.
•Though there is a gay character. I can't figure out who that one was originally.
•Okay, so I was trying to figure out who the gay person is, and in my research I found this: http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/mortal-instruments/articles/100275/title/cassandra-claires-plagiarism I wouldn't call what she was doing plagiarism, per se, as she at least made a vague attempt at crediting the origins of the quotes, but it reeks of not being particularly creative on her own, as she's relying on others works so heavily. Kind of makes sense why CoB feels so overdone to me. It really is just nothing but ideas someone else already had and did better.
•Oh! Clary just professed a disgust for rats and a love of hamsters. She just gets better and better.
•This plot is weirdly meandering. They went to a party to get answers about Clary's locked memories, and now they're running off to rescue her friend that was turned into a rat while at said party. So either a completely random aside or a very strange way to move the plot forward that feels random and useless even if it turns out not to be.
•Also, she shoved her friend-turned-rat into her bag, which pissed me off. Rats are perfectly capable of riding on shoulders. Maybe if she wasn't hating on rats so much in the first place.
•Clary's internal monologue is inane. They're going into a vampire's den, a den which was explained to her was on the upper floors of a boarded up building, which vampires can fly into, and she's asked, once in her head, and once aloud "What do vampires have against stairs?" in regards to broken ones they keep coming across. And I want to do the biggest facepalm ever. First, remember how they can fly? Fuck stairs. Second, totally deters humans from wandering in, but she's too fucking thick to get any of that. Also, when she asked that aloud, neither of those answers was actually given to her. Both answers were more on the metaphorical side, which makes me want to punch the author in the throat now.
•Oh no! The obviously evil guy is obviously evil! They're travelling with this guy who was pretending to be a human, but was so obviously always a vampire, which the reader figures out the second he walks onto the scene. The characters take significantly longer to figure it out. Please god tell me my writing isn't this obvious. I know it can be sometimes, but seriously. This is painful.
•And I'm pretty sure she just misused "bemused."
•And now I'm a little offended by something Clary just thought. It was along the lines of "She wondered if there were any ugly vampires or any fat ones. Maybe vampires didn't turn ugly people. Or maybe ugly people just didn't want to live forever." Well fuck you, too, you judgmental bitch.
•Or, to be petty, maybe it's the author's way of saying she doesn't want to be a vampire. :P
•More than anything, I continue to want to kick Jace in the face. I hate him, and I hate Clary, and I hope they end up doing some kind of Romeo and Juliet pact so they can die together like the inane assholes they are.
•This girl is really such a damsel in distress. I expected her to at least be competent. I expected her to be obnoxiously special and overly competent, in fact. But this is worse.
•She can't even enjoy a flying motorcycle. She has to get nauseous like a little bitch.
•Also, I'm losing count of the number of times she loses this fucking rat.
•And after hours of reading, we've finally completed the "let's chase after the rat" plot, and guess what? It was absolutely pointless. Seriously, I think this thing took up about 1/6th of the book and literally lead nowhere.
•She spends the entire book arguing with Jace, and when she finally goes off on someone, it's a pretty low key character who...okay...okay, actually I like this fight. She's having a little bitch fight with the gay boy, and it's pretty entertaining. Maybe I just like the gay boy, though. He's the only not obnoxious character, though he's not in it enough to be, I guess.
•"He started to say something, but was arrested mid-yawn." Is it just me, or does that not make any sense? She's trying to say that his speaking was interrupted by a yawn, obviously, but that's totally not what she said.
•"The apple tasted green." Yeah, it did.
•She's one of those girls that doesn't realize she's pretty until a boy tells her she is.
•Wow, and their first kiss is not dramatic at all. This is a retarded love story.
•We had a picnic and an underwhelming kiss, and now we're all touchy lovey. And apparently it's fucking time. Or make out time. Whatever.
•Oh my god, now they're having a whiny teenager fight. I'm seriously questioning why I'm still reading this.
Something I didn't mention in my last review is that the book starts with a Shakespeare quote, then there's immediately another quote to start part 1, this time from Paradise Lost by John Milton. My comment to Lyndsey about this was that I found it horribly pretentious and unneccessary, and now, having actually read part one, I can say that while I see how the Shakespeare quote fits, the Milton one seems horribly out of place and simply is there to say "Look at me! I've read Paradise Lost. I'm smart." I'm mentioning this now because my first comment is a follow up to that.
•So the quote for the beginning of part 2? It's not even in english. Seriously, are we seeing how this is pretentious yet?
•Yet another lovely personality trait of Clary's: drops something. blames the loss of it on someone else.
And now Jace is telling a meta story about a boy training a bird. Shoot me.
•It's a "look at how broken I am. love me" story.
•Also, the scene was about Clary not being able to sleep, and then Jace tells her a story and suddenly she's so exhausted that she just fucking passes out like she was drugged.
•And also, she likes to bring up her orange bedroom walls because she's fun and quirky, while she disparages the other girl's choices because obviously the other girl is horrible, and Clary is the only worthwhile female. And now she's getting a makeover so she's hot.
•Though there is a gay character. I can't figure out who that one was originally.
•Okay, so I was trying to figure out who the gay person is, and in my research I found this: http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/mortal-instruments/articles/100275/title/cassandra-claires-plagiarism I wouldn't call what she was doing plagiarism, per se, as she at least made a vague attempt at crediting the origins of the quotes, but it reeks of not being particularly creative on her own, as she's relying on others works so heavily. Kind of makes sense why CoB feels so overdone to me. It really is just nothing but ideas someone else already had and did better.
•Oh! Clary just professed a disgust for rats and a love of hamsters. She just gets better and better.
•This plot is weirdly meandering. They went to a party to get answers about Clary's locked memories, and now they're running off to rescue her friend that was turned into a rat while at said party. So either a completely random aside or a very strange way to move the plot forward that feels random and useless even if it turns out not to be.
•Also, she shoved her friend-turned-rat into her bag, which pissed me off. Rats are perfectly capable of riding on shoulders. Maybe if she wasn't hating on rats so much in the first place.
•Clary's internal monologue is inane. They're going into a vampire's den, a den which was explained to her was on the upper floors of a boarded up building, which vampires can fly into, and she's asked, once in her head, and once aloud "What do vampires have against stairs?" in regards to broken ones they keep coming across. And I want to do the biggest facepalm ever. First, remember how they can fly? Fuck stairs. Second, totally deters humans from wandering in, but she's too fucking thick to get any of that. Also, when she asked that aloud, neither of those answers was actually given to her. Both answers were more on the metaphorical side, which makes me want to punch the author in the throat now.
•Oh no! The obviously evil guy is obviously evil! They're travelling with this guy who was pretending to be a human, but was so obviously always a vampire, which the reader figures out the second he walks onto the scene. The characters take significantly longer to figure it out. Please god tell me my writing isn't this obvious. I know it can be sometimes, but seriously. This is painful.
•And I'm pretty sure she just misused "bemused."
•And now I'm a little offended by something Clary just thought. It was along the lines of "She wondered if there were any ugly vampires or any fat ones. Maybe vampires didn't turn ugly people. Or maybe ugly people just didn't want to live forever." Well fuck you, too, you judgmental bitch.
•Or, to be petty, maybe it's the author's way of saying she doesn't want to be a vampire. :P
•More than anything, I continue to want to kick Jace in the face. I hate him, and I hate Clary, and I hope they end up doing some kind of Romeo and Juliet pact so they can die together like the inane assholes they are.
•This girl is really such a damsel in distress. I expected her to at least be competent. I expected her to be obnoxiously special and overly competent, in fact. But this is worse.
•She can't even enjoy a flying motorcycle. She has to get nauseous like a little bitch.
•Also, I'm losing count of the number of times she loses this fucking rat.
•And after hours of reading, we've finally completed the "let's chase after the rat" plot, and guess what? It was absolutely pointless. Seriously, I think this thing took up about 1/6th of the book and literally lead nowhere.
•She spends the entire book arguing with Jace, and when she finally goes off on someone, it's a pretty low key character who...okay...okay, actually I like this fight. She's having a little bitch fight with the gay boy, and it's pretty entertaining. Maybe I just like the gay boy, though. He's the only not obnoxious character, though he's not in it enough to be, I guess.
•"He started to say something, but was arrested mid-yawn." Is it just me, or does that not make any sense? She's trying to say that his speaking was interrupted by a yawn, obviously, but that's totally not what she said.
•"The apple tasted green." Yeah, it did.
•She's one of those girls that doesn't realize she's pretty until a boy tells her she is.
•Wow, and their first kiss is not dramatic at all. This is a retarded love story.
•We had a picnic and an underwhelming kiss, and now we're all touchy lovey. And apparently it's fucking time. Or make out time. Whatever.
•Oh my god, now they're having a whiny teenager fight. I'm seriously questioning why I'm still reading this.