Queen of Air and Darkness

What if damnation is the price of true love?Innocent blood has been spilled on the steps of the Council Hall, the sacred and famous stronghold of the Shadowhunters. In the wake of the tragic death of Livia Blackthorn, the Clave teeters on the brink of out and out civil war. One fragment of the Blackthorn family flees to the institute in Los Angeles, seeking to hopefully discover the source of the disease that is destroying the race of warlocks. Meanwhile, Julian and Emma start taking a desperate measure to try to put their forbidden love aside and undertake a perilous mission to Faerie to retrieve the Black Volume of the Dead. When they find in the Courts is a secret that may tear the Shadow World asunder and open a dark path into a future they could never imagined. They then find themselves caught in a race against time, they must save the world before the deadly power of the Parabatai curse destroys them and everyone that they love.Everything I have read in the Shadowhunter universe has led up to this moment and i have not been disappointed with how this has turned out. I now have a new set of friends whom i have become invested in and can not wait to go one more adventure. This has been an adventure this year and I can not wait until we get the next installments of the world. This book follows immediately after the events which happened in Los Angeles, the fascists are still trying to control the Clave and intent on dictate how the Downworlders should be treated. With the warlocks hurting and disruption in the Faerie, many of our beloved characters are missing, however so many individuals are grieving the loss of loved ones. This book in my opinion that this book is a love letter turned in to a letter of grief and Clare does this is a way no other author can do it.

“You have been the blade in my hand, even when I carried no weapons. You were my sword and shield against every moment I felt worthless, against every moment I hated myself, against every time I thought I wasn’t good enough.”Cassandra Clare concludes the Dark Artifices trilogy with a war between shadowhunters and fae. This book is not without her usual plot devices or tropes, but it remains to be a strong finish to a really hard fought race.As ever, the themes of family, friendship, loyalty and identity weave themselves throughout the novel, however she tries something new with a new polyamorous take on the typical love triangle and introduces a transgender character; this fits in so well with her already established diverse character base rather than feeling like a deliberate plot device to broaden her audience.The plot is difficult to discuss without spoiling events from the previous books, but requires the characters to almost exclusively divide into groups on various missions. Because of this, we spend a lot of time in each chapter jumping between characters but also between different settings and this was really well done – it felt more authentic, realistic and created a complexity to her plot which had been lacking in previous books; it was just more polished.Emma and Julien’s war against the Parabatai curse, Ty’s determination to avenge Livvy’s death and Kit’s questionable heritage are the main focus within the Queen of Air and Darkness whilst all of the characters try to establish the cause for the warlock’s ever-increasing sickness. The enormous cast should have been difficult to keep tabs on considering the number of differently storylines merging, but somehow it works really well. I especially appreciated some of the more discreet events Cassandra Clare left for fans of the wider series – a deceased parabatai from a previous novel attends the funeral of his newly deceased parabatai. Small touches like this, which hark back to previous novels, are exactly what makes these books so likeable – whilst this is definitely designed to be a deliberate emotional pull for readers, it’s clever and it has large impact.The illustrations throughout the book were moody and entirely fitting with each section of the story. However, a few family trees would have gone a long way to keeping tabs on the lineage of a lot of characters and this would have been a nice addition.Despite the strong pacing and equally strong execution of the plot, there were a number of flaws which began to detract from my enjoyment. There are so many repeated plot devices throughout Cassandra Clare’s various collections – it just isn’t necessary to always include star-crossed lovers, a love interest suddenly losing themselves for whatever reason and becoming cold (this is always the man too which is equally frustrating!), duplicate versions of characters who are secretly demons/from another dimension/not really dead. It’s all been done before, by her no less, and it became a more prevalent issue for me as the book progressed and I could see each idea forming; it’s unoriginal story-telling and felt like a lazy approach.Similarly, I struggled with the disparity in formal to informal language use. I appreciate that Clare presents her fae characters as otherworldly, ancient and therefore inherently more formal – actually I like that – but sometimes she slips into allowing her present day (often adolescent) characters speak in the same fashion and this doesn’t fit their characters at all. Something as simple as, “I don’t really want to do that” from a small child who usually speaks informally would be presented as, “I do not wish to carry out that action”. It felt like she’d gotten used to writing in one style and forgot to revert back to a different characters normal narrative voice.Nevertheless, this was an enjoyable and surprisingly quick read (considering the 900+ page length) which tied off loose ends, developed the shadowhunter world a little bit more and a little bit better, and most of all concluded the trilogy with enough holes left to hint at her next series.

I've just re-read this book for the second time and was struck once again by how patchy it is. ***Warning: possible spoilers***If you've read any of Cassandra Clare's books before, you'll know that she's a great writer with a real knack for characterisation. These things are very much evident in Queen of Air and Darkness, with a super cast of characters that you can't help but care about and a very engaging narrative style. I particularly liked Kieran, Kit, Ty and Dru (who has a bigger role in this book than the previous two) - I think Cassandra Clare has a real knack for writing these slightly oddball, outcast characters.So why only 3 stars? Well I think the main reason is down to the plot, which is just a bit of a mess. So much is crammed into this novel that "major events" - and there are a lot of them - just sort of pass you by, without any of the dramatic impact that you would usually expect from one of Clare's novels (I'm particularly thinking about Livvy's death in the previous book). The whole giant nephilim plot point (you'll know what I mean if you've read it) is also utterly ridiculous. I genuinely cringed reading it! It was also so disappointing that the Cohort storyline wasn't properly resolved - it looked like it was going to be, and then suddenly Zara seems to have the upper hand again and everyone just does what she wants without any real resistance!I always like the romantic relationships in Clare's books, but I did feel as though there was quite a lot of going round in circles here. Julian and Emma, and Mark, Kieran and Cristina, all seemed to have the same conversation/ interaction multiple times and it really just slowed the plot down. They were very readable interactions, as you'd expect from Clare, but they were quite repetitive! She does forbidden love really well, but I don't think that Emma and Julian's storyline really merited being stretched out over 3 books. There wasn't anything "new" and I didn't like Julian's attempt to switch off his emotions, which reminded me a bit of the stupid humanity switch in The Vampire Diaries (though of course, Clare does it much better and much more thoughtfully).There were other minor points that niggled at me too. Another reviewer has mentioned the relationship between Gwyn and Diana and I have to agree - what does she see in him? He is presented in book 1 as this incredibly ruthless character who caused a lot of suffering for Mark/ Kieran, yet suddenly he's ok just because he's nice to Diana? I thought she deserved better tbf. The constantly changing POV was a bit much as well. I normally like this in Clare's books because you get to see things from everyone's perspective and you know what is happening in different places. But it was a bit TOO much in this book. I remember the first book had Emma as the main POV character, with some scenes from the POV of Cristina, Julian and Mark. This one had Kit, Dru, Kieran, Diana, Jaime, Diego, Helen, Aline, Alec/ Magnus, Jace....it just made everything a bit convoluted. I liked quite a few of these POV characters, don't get me wrong, but it was not conducive to a smooth plot.Ultimately, if you asked me what actually happened in this novel or what they key plot point was, I would struggle to be able to tell you. My least favourite element was the completely random bit in the middle where Emma and Julian are stuck in the middle of Thule - you could honestly take almost this entire section out without it having any negative impact on the plot whatsoever!Like all of Clare's books this is readable, with good characters and great world building. So if you have read and enjoyed her other books, you are unlikely to hate this (I certainly didn't). It just isn't one of her best.

Ok so this will be a bit controversial but this is not my favourite series from Cassandra Clare. I’m a huge fan of her other books but for me this series just seemed to drag on and on and quite a bit of repetition was happening in the explanations and linking to previous books.I loved most of the characters and I was very happy at the end of this book with how it ended. I loved that Tessa and Jem made a few more appearances, and I was even swayed by Kieran/Mark/Cristina story by the end.I would recommend them but I definitely felt that they were a bit longer than usual-and not just because of the size but if content as well.

I love the Shadowhunter series, I’ve read all the previous and own most of the books, I cannot fault Cassandra’s writing, it’s brilliant!! My only reason for giving it 4 stars is the fact that it’s so much taller than the rest of her collection and stands out massively on my bookshelf which is driving me insane, I really hope she releases a shorter version of it, it’s too out of place from the rest of the series.