Jace leaned forward and banged his hand against the partition separating them from the cab driver. “Turn left! Left! I said to take Broadway, you brain-dead moron!”And this is how the 11th chapter of this wondrous book opens up—our romantic hero abusing a service worker—sooooo charming, right ladies? I’m sure we’re all just falling over ourselves to find someone like him.
Basically, Jace wants breakfast and he wants it now. I don’t get this—we literally left off with Clary finding out someone really fucking powerful left a block in her brain and it’s up to her to figure it out so she can find her mother, and yet here we are listening to Jace invite the whole freaking gang out for breakfast because... why? Does this scene need to happen?
Jace elbowed Clary out of the car. When he landed on the pavement behind her, he stretched like a cat and spread his arms wide.
Pause to laugh at this image—I’m sure she didn’t intend to make us picture Jace landing on all fours and then actually stretching like a cat, but I’m so glad she did.
Fairy sort of becomes us in this bit of dialogue, getting annoyed that they’re eating when she wants to figure out what’s going on. Which, awesome, what’s stopping you from taking off and figuring it out yourself?
They pause to explain this book’s version of Squibs, called “ifrits”, which... sure. Why not?
Finally, finally, Isabelle shows up with Simon, so Fairy has someone to hate on in this booth:
Isabelle’s hair tickled her face, smelling of some kind of vanilla perfume. Clary fought the urge to sneeze. She hated vanilla perfume. She’d never understood why some girls felt the need to smell like dessert.
I dunno, Fairy, maybe because they like that smell? What do you smell like, Tommy Fresh?
 |
| it's the newest lady version-- it smells like internalised misogyny and weak character development. |
They have this really, really weird conversation that almost touches on the topic of inequality between all these species—specifically, Fairy wants to know why Shadowhunters are charged with killing demons if they seem to be able to get on with them in public spaces, for instance in the restaurant they’re in. It gets uncomfortable, because while it could have been an interesting way to actually make a juxtaposition between inequalities in our world, it instead turns into the rest of them dismissing Fairy and her not bothering to argue the point, really.
It turns out that the warlock that Fairy is looking for is throwing a huge fucking party in Brooklyn for people, and just handing out random flyers to it. I’m not going to lie to you—I laughed for a minute when they said that.
They all head back to the institute to rest up for their crazy party night; this is starting to sound like what my friends and I do before we head out places—the only thing that’s missing is a red bull run and maybe a trip to go get some carb-heavy foods for right before we go out.
Isabelle and Simon announced their intention of going for a walk in Central Park so that she could show him the faerie circles. Simon asked Clary if she wanted to come along. Stifling a murderous rage, she refused on the grounds of exhaustion.
Why would that make you upset? He clearly asked if you wanted go with them on something that Isabelle clearly suggested as a date, if anyone has a right to be mad, it’s her.
She tries to take a nap, and then this sentence happens:
The caffeine in her veins fizzed like carbonated water, and her mind was full of darting images.
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| maybe yzma poisoned her? now that's a crossover I need to see. |
Fairy, I hate to break this to you, but I think someone put drugs in your coffee.
Seriously, speaking as someone who downs like 6 cups a day—caffeine should never fizz.
Fairy obviously can’t sleep, what with all the fizzing and the 'caffeine' in her veins, so instead she decides to go talk to Hodge, and in the meantime snoop through some books on his desk.
An old photo of
We kind of get an explanation for The Circle—which, are probably more like Death Eaters and less like The Order, actually, so my bad. It sounds like this novel is kind of trying to excuse those who originally joined this circle that was created to kill all things ‘nonhuman’, which... okay...
She finds a connection to her dream, that there used to be dances like the ones she dreamt about in The Glass City, and I’m still having a hard time understanding why on earth I should care.
“I can’t sleep. I keep thinking too much. Could you …”
“Ah, the unquiet mind.” His voice was full of sympathy. “I can give you something for that. Wait here.”
This is weird for me. I don’t know why, but it just is.
Just as she re-enters her room after she’s done talking to Hodge, she sees that Jace has decided to invade her space and look at her sketchbook—really, ladies, take a number, he’s so dreamy!
She drops her sleeping potion and Jace says this:
“If only Simon were here. He could probably bore you to sleep.”
Clary was in no mood to defend Simon.
Wow, Fairy, you’re the best friend on the face of this planet. Really, people should give you awards.
He then offers to tell her a bedtime story, and it’s really strange. I’m sure this is another allegory for a theme in the story, but holy shit this is weird.
Basically, a boy tames a pet falcon that his father gives to him, and then when he’s got it perfectly tamed, he shows it to his father and his father snaps its neck in front of this boy and yells at him for taming it:
‘Instead, you taught it to love you. Falcons are not meant to be loving pets: They are fierce and wild, savage and cruel. This bird was not tamed; it was broken.’
“Later, when his father left him, the boy cried over his pet, until eventually his father sent a servant to take the body of the bird away and bury it. The boy never cried again, and he never forgot what he’d learned: that to love is to destroy, and that to be loved is to be the one destroyed.”
No. No no no no no. This is setting up a gross disgusting backstory of a poor damaged boy (probably Jace) who ‘can’t open himself up to love’ and Fairy is gonna be the one to fix him. I don’t want to deal with this bullshit ‘men are jaded and women need to teach them how to love again’ trope—it’s tired and it’s also not worth my time.
Anyway, Fairy talks about how fucked up the story is but then falls right to sleep, which concludes that pointless part of the chapter. Then we skip right ahead to midnight, where Isabelle is beautifully dressed and waking Fairy up and GASP HOW CAN FAIRY EVEN THINK OF WEARING THOSE CLOTHES TO A PARTY WE NEED TO DRESS YOU.
Clary watched Isabelle in the mirror as she rifled through her closet. Her room looked as if a disco ball had exploded inside it. The walls were black and shimmered with swirls of sponged-on golden paint. Clothes were strewn everywhere: on the rumpled black bed, hung over the backs of the wooden chairs, spilling out of the closet and the tall wardrobe propped against one wall. Her vanity table, its mirror rimmed with spangled pink fur, was covered in glitter, sequins, and pots of blush and powder.
Wow, Isabelle’s room sounds amazing. Sign me up for a friend like this, seriously.
Isabelle dresses her in an outfit straight out of the 1999 VMAs:
She had to admit that the combination of short black dress, fishnets, and high boots was fairly badass.
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| if the question you're asking is do i stilll know this whole movie memorised then the answer is yes, yes i do. |
Who actually uses the term 'badass' in a novel? CC, that's who.
Then of course, we have to makeover her hair and her makeup, and you bet your ass we’re gonna read about all of it.
Basically, this scene is kind of important I guess because... Fairy ‘guesses’ that Alec is gay? Yay for representation, I guess, but I feel weird that we’re finding it out via Isabelle and Fairy and not... actually... Alec...
Also apparently the Shadowhunters and The Clave and whatever they call themselves aren’t really down with any homosexuality so Fairy cannot say anything.
They swiftly move past this weird interlude after Fairy declares herself beautiful and oh my god she can’t believe makeup actually makes people look good:
 |
| go educate yourself if you don't know this reference. |
And then Isabelle becomes my fave person ever because she declares that she has weapons with her and they’re in the form of anklets:
Isabelle smiled, kicking her feet up so that her anklets jingled like Christmas bells. “These, for instance. The left one is electrum, which is poisonous to demons, and the right one is blessed iron, in case I run across any unfriendly vampires or even faeries—faeries hate iron. They both have strength runes carved into them, so I can pack a hell of a kick.”
MARRY ME ISABELLE. YOU ARE WONDERFUL. Let’s go have Chinese food and talk about how much of a wet towel Fairy is.
They go to meet the guys (including Simon for some reason), and of course Fairy has to snark about Simon looking at Isabelle, but then acting surprised that he looks at her instead.
Hint: Fairy, he’s in love with you.
Even half in demon hunter clothes, Clary thought, he looked like the sort of boy who’d come over to your house to pick you up for a date and be polite to your parents and nice to your pets.
Oh, ew, gross. Polite guys that are nice to your parents and your pets—what a lame thing!
They give her a dagger, which makes no fucking sense since she hasn’t been trained to use one? Why would you do that, she'll probably be more of a liability than help now.
There’s a really good scene in one of my favourite books, Graceling (which you should all check out), where the protagonist teaches a young girl to use a dagger for protection. There’s none of the “omg wow she was soo good within a week” bullshit, instead she sucks a lot, and she has to walk around with the dagger for days and days to just get used to it before she can even begin to learn how to actually use it in combat.
The reason I love that scene so much is that it’s really realistic—yeah, some people might have a really good predisposition to fighting and weapons, but there is no one on this earth that can pick one up and instantly be good at using it. I don’t care if it’s “in [her] blood” like Jace says, there is no way she can use that dagger properly.
And then Isabelle offers her a thigh sheath which, Isabelle, I love you so much.
This chapter ends with a really decent scene that would be pretty hot until you remember that Simon, Alec, and Isabelle were all there watching this:
She looked up from closing it to find Jace watching her through hooded eyes. “And one last thing,” he said. He reached over and pulled the sparkling pins out of her hair, so that it fell in warm and heavy curls down her neck. The sensation of hair tickling her bare skin was unfamiliar and oddly pleasant.
“Much better,” he said, and she thought this time that maybe his voice was slightly uneven too.
I sincerely hope Isabelle is in the background being held back by Simon and Alec like, “I SPENT AN HOUR ON THAT HAIRDO HOW DARE YOU TAKE IT OUT ALEC STOP HOLDING ON TO ME I’M GONNA GIVE HIM WHAT HE DESERVES HE THINKS HE KNOWS ABOUT FASHION IN HIS DUMB BLACK CLOTHING I WILL CUT YOU”.
And that’s it! Guess what, we found out about the party 10 pages ago and we’re literally just about to go to it! And I bet you anything that the next chapter starts with transportation because who the fuck cares about plot?
This book is the literal equivalent of accidentally overstuffing yourself on bread at a restaurant while you’re thinking about all the great food you're gonna order and then it comes and you're like, "I'm... too full for this. I don't want it anymore." It's the Olive Garden breadstick of books, okay?
Until next time!
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