First Ten Books I Ever Reviewed

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together. This week's topic is First Ten Books I Ever Reviewed.

1. Hush, Hush (Hush, Hush, # 1) by Becca Fitzpatrick
2. Good to Great by Jim Collins
3. The Dark and Hollow Places (The Forest of Hands and Teeth, # 3) by Carrie Ryan
4. Crescendo (Hush, Hush, # 2) by Becca Fitzpatrick
5. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Harry Potter, # 4) by JK Rowling
6. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Harry Potter, # 5) by JK Rowling
7. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Harry Potter, # 6) by JK Rowling
8. City of Fallen Angels (The Mortal Instruments, # 4) by Cassandra Clare
9. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Harry Potter, # 7) by JK Rowling - My only half decent review of the entire series.
10. Sea Change by Aimee Friedman

You guys it is almost embarrassing to even post these reviews. I had no idea what I was doing with reviewing a book. I didn't even know what I wanted my blog to be at that point. And I certainly didn't review ANY of the Harry Potter books (save MAYBE The Deathly Hallows) with any real skill or even worthy of the books or the series themselves. I've always intended to re-read and then update my reviews of the series but I just haven't yet. Which books were your first reviews? Let me know!

Top Books I've Read On Recommendation

Top 10 Tuesday is a post hosted by The Broke and the Bookish and this week's topic is Top Ten Books I've Read on Recommendation.

When I started reading again, I was mostly getting whatever books Holly passed down to me. That being said, I've had some majorly great books recommended to me. These were mostly recommended to me when I first started reading again because once I started blogging my TBR list exploded and most of those are books that I've found on my own or through Goodreads. Regardless, I still have some friends that will throw recommendations my way these days. I just don't always get to them as quickly as I used to.

1. The Key (True Reign, # 1) by Jennifer Anne Davis - Recommended by Holly
2. Unbreakable (Unbreakable, # 1) by Rebecca Shea - Recommended on FB by Colleen Hoover
3. 7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess by Jen Hatmaker - Recommended by my friend, Kay
4. Vampire Academy (Vampire Academy, # 1) by Richelle Mead - Recommended by Holly
5. City of Bones (The Mortal Instruments, # 1) by Cassandra Clare - Recommended by Holly
6. Ten Tiny Breaths (Ten Tiny Breaths, # 1) by KA Tucker - Recommended by Holly
7. The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, # 1) by Suzanne Collins - Recommended by my friend, Lacy
8. Divergent (Divergent, # 1) by Veronica Roth - Recommended by my friend, Lacy
9. V is for Virgin (V is for Virgin, # 1) by Kelly Oram - Recommended by Holly
10. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (Harry Potter, # 1) by JK Rowling - Recommended by my friend, Lacy
11. Hush, Hush (Hush, Hush, # 1) by Becca Fitzpatrick - Recommended by my friend, Paula
12. Twilight (Twilight, # 1) by Stephenie Meyer - Recommended by Holly
13. Throne of Glass (Throne of Glass, # 1) by Sarah J Maas - Recommended by Holly

What are the best books that you've read based on recommendations? Let me know!

Top Ten Book Villains

Top 10 Tuesday is a post hosted by The Broke and the Bookish and this week's topic is Top Ten Villains.

This post is all about those characters we love to hate. I had to cull through some of the books and series where the enemy was a group of people or the government so that I could choose the books that truly had individual characters as villains.

1. Lord Voldemort from Harry Potter by JK Rowling
2. Queen Levana from The Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer
3. Jackal & Octavia from Red Rising by Pierce Brown
4. Cersei Lannister from A Song of Ice and Fire by George R R Martin
5. Sebastian from The Mortal Instruments by Cassandra Clare
6. Jonathan from The Breathing Series by Rebecca Donovan (not your typical villain, but man I hated that guy!)
7. Billy Dent from Jasper Dent by Barry Lyga
8. President Snow from The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
9. The Darkling from The Grisha by Leigh Bardugo (note, I still haven't finished Ruin and Rising)
10. Sauron from The Lord of the Rings by J R R Tolkien

There were so many villains to choose from. The hardest part was limiting myself and not including groups of people. Who made your list of top villains? Let me know!

City of Heavenly Fire - Review

City of Heavenly Fire (The Mortal Instruments, # 6)

By: Cassandra Clare

Published: May 27th 2014 by Margaret K. McElderry

725 pages

Genre: YA, Fantasy, Paranormal

Source: Own/Personal Library

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Goodreads description--ΕRCHOMAI, SEBASTIAN HAD SAID.

I am coming.

Darkness returns to the Shadowhunter world. As their society falls apart around them, Clary, Jace, Simon and their friends must band together to fight the greatest evil the Nephilim have ever faced: Clary’s own brother. Nothing in the world can defeat him — must they journey to another world to find the chance? Lives will be lost, love sacrificed, and the whole world changed in the sixth and last installment of the Mortal Instruments series!

Oh my goodness you guys! Now THAT is how you end a series. First let me just say that this book is MASSIVE! When it came in the mail I was so surprised at how large it was. Apparently, I knew at some point that it was over 700 pages because I’d featured it in a Waiting on Wednesday post before, but I guess that didn’t really sink in. I remember thinking that the beginning was slightly slow for me, but I was determined not to get bogged down so I pushed through and continued reading even when I might have found it easier to put the book down. The multiple narrators adds to the ease of putting this book down for me. While I like that Cassandra Clare writes from so many different perspectives within each book, I found myself getting frustrated with the narration swap at times. This is one of those books where not only are there mini-cliffhangers at chapter breaks but also within the chapter when the narration would change from one character to another. Things would be getting really good with one character, then there would be a mini-cliffhanger and she’d swap narration to a completely different character. I get the point. It’s designed to keep you coming back for more, but in reality sometimes I think that makes it easier to put the book down. When I’m reading from Clary and something major happens and then we swap to Simon, who’s not even with the other characters, I’m like “Meh, I don’t want to read about Simon right now. I want to know what happens with Clary. Oh well, maybe this is a good stopping point for the night.” But like I said, I was determined to blow through this book, and so I would keep reading regardless of those moments. But don’t be alarmed. That kind of pacing didn’t last too long. And as luck would have it, I was able to continue reading for large chunks of time—at one point I think I read 300 pages easily in one sitting.

At times I also worried about whether there were too many plot threads going at one time. I felt spread thin there for a bit and even wondered briefly if Cassie Clare could pull all the threads together by the end of the book, but I worried for nothing. I supposed with 725 pages there should be plenty of time to wrap up all the pieces of the puzzle. One of my favorite things about series and authors who do them well (Cassandra Clare being one of those authors), is when every single piece has purpose and how it all ties together from beginning to end. JK Rowling, Richelle Mead, and now Cassandra Clare are masters at this. It’s hard to say how much of the original three books was intended to tie in with these last three as well as the spin off series The Infernal Devices and the upcoming spin off series The Dark Artifices and how much she made fit after the fact, but either way the brilliance is to be applauded. It’s one thing for an author to foreshadow in book 1 events to come in book 6, but being able to reference the past and foreshadow the future as well as address the present in one singular moment takes this skill to a whole new level. Wow. Just wow you guys!

Speaking of The Dark Artifices, I absolutely adored the addition of Emma and Julian’s storyline. While I was worried about it taking too much of the focus, Cassandra Clare wowed me again. She proved to put in just enough of Emma and Julian so that I could feel like I know them, understand them, and am now invested in them. As if I wasn’t going to read their story anyway, now I know without a doubt that I’ll be all over Lady Midnight on release day of 2015. I loved seeing this piece of the puzzle now so that flashbacks won’t even be necessary when it comes time to start The Dark Artifices—though I’m sure there will still be flashbacks. I can already see conflict getting set up and plot points and I absolutely adored Emma and Julian’s relationship, and I am so excited about what’s to come with them.

In the same way, I absolutely loved all the tie-ins from The Infernal Devices as well. The references to the events of the past. The inclusion of Brother Zachariah. Seeing how Brother Zachariah is changed as it is happening. Finally seeing Tessa again. You guys know, that I wasn’t happy with the ending of Clockwork Princess. But now that I’ve had time to accept this ending, I was able to enjoy seeing more about Tessa and Jem than I though I would be. (Still Team Will though.)

One of my favorite things about this series and about Cassandra Clare’s writing in general is the wit. I love the sarcasm. I love the one-liners. And while Jace wasn’t as snarky in this installment of the series, the wit was still there. There was one scene fairly early on when Jace and Magnus were talking that had me cracking up. Both are typically funny and the combination was pretty good.

Favorite quotes (far too many of them, I'm aware):

”Friends don’t let friends keep calling their exes and hanging up.”

”It smells like heartbreak in here,” said Jace. “That’s the Chinese food.” [Magnus]

”Change yourself,” Alec said…

”Everyone should die with someone holding onto them,” Maia said…

”I only have two reactions to bad news. Uncontrollable rage and then a sharp left turn into boiling self-hatred.” [Jace]

”God knows we haven’t exactly been able to do all that much lately, but every time I kiss you, every time you touch me, it’s a victory, if you ask me. Sebastain, he did what he did because—because he doesn’t understand the difference between loving and having. Between giving yourself and taking. And he thought that if he could make me give myself, then he’d have me, I’d be his, and to him that’s love, because he doesn’t know anything else. But when I touch you, I do it because I want to, and that’s all the difference. And he doesn’t get to have that or take it away from me. He doesn’t,”… [Clary]

”Which body is that of young Longford? The one who killed his parabatai?” “There,” Jia pointed. “Why do you want to know?” “It is the worst thing I can imagine ever having to do. I would not have been brave enough. Since there is someone who was, I wish to pay my respects to him,” said Zachariah.

”We will stand bravely with you!” Malcolm announced. Catarina looked darkly at him, and he quailed. “Well, we will stand barely near you. Or at least within earshot.”

”Don’t look at me,” said Jace. “My adoptive father was a mass murderer. And I still worried about what he thought.”

”I loved you recklessly from the moment I knew you. I never cared about the consequences. I told myself I did, I told myself you wanted me to, and so I tried, but I never did. I wanted you more than I wanted to be good. I wanted you more than anything, ever.” [Jace]

”Sometimes it’s braver not to fight. Protect them, and save your vengeance for another day.” [Zachariah]

There was so much goodness to The Mortal Instruments series. The characters. The world. The storyline. The conflict. The resolution. The execution. The writing. All of it. Just extremely well done. I feel like I could go on and on talking about this series for quite some time, but this review has gotten long enough. Just know that this is the way you wrap up a series. I can’t wait to get my hands on the beginning of The Dark Artifices.

City of Heavenly Fire was a great ending to the series. The characters we love were all there in all the glory that caused us to fall in love with them in the first place. Cassandra Clare pulled all the puzzle pieces together and even set up the next series so perfectly. City of Heavenly Fire gets 4.5 Stars from me. Have you read City of Heavenly Fire? What did you think? Let me know!

City of Lost Souls - Review

City of Lost Souls (The Mortal Instruments, # 5)

By: Cassandra Clare

Published: May 8th 2012 by Margaret K. McElderr

535 pages

Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy, Paranormal, Angels, Vampires

Source: Personal Library

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*Note: The above links to Amazon and Book Depository are affiliate links. Affiliate links support giveaways for Somewhere Only We Know readers.

Goodreads description--The New York Times bestselling Mortal Instruments continues—and so do the thrills and danger for Jace, Clary, and Simon.

What price is too high to pay, even for love? When Jace and Clary meet again, Clary is horrified to discover that the demon Lilith’s magic has bound her beloved Jace together with her evil brother Sebastian, and that Jace has become a servant of evil. The Clave is out to destroy Sebastian, but there is no way to harm one boy without destroying the other. As Alec, Magnus, Simon, and Isabelle wheedle and bargain with Seelies, demons, and the merciless Iron Sisters to try to save Jace, Clary plays a dangerous game of her own. The price of losing is not just her own life, but Jace’s soul. She’s willing to do anything for Jace, but can she still trust him? Or is he truly lost?

Love. Blood. Betrayal. Revenge. Darkness threatens to claim the Shadowhunters in the harrowing fifth book of the Mortal Instruments series.

Oh boy! I’m still overflowing with giddiness over this book. I feel like I need to apologize to Cassandra Clare yet AGAIN (for like what? The 5th time or something?)! Sometimes I believe myself able to predict the future (which is totally not possible in case you were wondering). I trust my sense of direction so strongly that I almost believe that what I see lying ahead of me (usually when faced with only partial information) is so set in stone that I forget that other possibilities exist (as often more information exists as well). As much as I think I’d love to be able to predict the future, and as often as my predictions do ring true, I don’t have this ability and my predictions just as often fall short. After reading Clockwork Angel, all I could see were the similarities between The Infernal Devices and The Mortal Instruments. The characters, the plot, the bad guys, the twists, the overall story arc that I perceived, the timing and rhythm of events…it all felt so similar. Then of course I read City of Fallen Angels, and I was just left so distraught after reading it. I was one of those readers that felt closure with the way City of Glass ended. I wasn’t happy that Clary and Jace had just gotten settled and conflict smacks them in the face yet again. I didn’t want them facing these new challenges. I’m one of those readers who typically likes the classic American happy ending. I thought my characters had gotten their happy ending, only for it to be ripped right out from under them. I felt like these characters that I’ve come to love were going to have at least one if not two other books to struggle through adversity with little hope of a happy ending in sight until the end of the upcoming book, City of Heavenly Fire. And while conflict is absolutely essential to any good story—no one wants to read about people who are happy ALL the time—I personally have a hard time going into a book knowing (or assuming) that “happy” isn’t anywhere in sight. Cassandra Clare said to be patient, to trust her, that she loves these characters just as much if not more than the reader does…well I didn’t listen. Summing all of that up, over those two books (Clockwork Angel and City of Fallen Angels), I was just overall disappointed.

And because of that disappointment, I put off reading Clockwork Prince until recently (you can read my review here) and was blown away. As I said in that review, the two series, while similar, really started showing their differences in that book. And I LOVED Clockwork Prince. It was the book that stood out for me as exceptional in a sea of “pretty good” and “okay/average.” (Not every book can be 5 Star worthy.) That being said, while City of Lost Souls doesn’t get the 5 star rating, I’m giving it a solid 4.5.

I was fully prepared, expecting, and assuming for Clary and Jace to not even see each other for the majority of this book. And that was just a depressing outlook to me and a failed prediction on my part. City of Lost Souls did have a semi-slow start for me. I think it was around 70-80ish pages before I was really starting to get excited about it. Up until then I still believed my preconceived ideas would hold true. And because Cassie Clare proved me wrong, I was majorly excited about seeing what else she might prove me wrong about. (As you can see, my being wrong in a prediction is by no means a bad thing in my opinion).

I struggled right along with Clary and the questions she had in her mind about Jace, about Sebastain/Jonathan, about right and wrong. I enjoyed the swapping of narrators. Though sometimes this is annoying to me and I’d rather stick with one main character, it works for this book. And any character is fair game as a possible narrator in this series. I really liked Maia and Jordan. And while I like what’s happening between Simon and Isabelle, I find myself asking what is it about him that she likes? I mean I like him, but why does she? Sometimes I’m not sure that’s explored or flushed out as clearly as I would like. Oh and Sebastain…there in the last 100-150 pages…well…I don’t want to give anything away, but let me just say “Oh my!”. There are more crossovers between The Mortal Instruments series and The Infernal Devices series, which I also really enjoy. And I have a major prediction of my own about a crossover between the series that I can’t share as of now, but if it comes about I will totally say that I called it. I told my husband so that I have a witness.

And one last thing for now, I actually thoroughly enjoy how frequently the characters refer back to their own words to each other or one character remembers words that another character said to them. Because that’s life. We do that all the time. And I absolutely hate when a series isn’t consistent or when a character appears to have forgotten something that I just don’t buy them forgetting. I really enjoy this and it just goes to show how well Cassandra Clare ties everything together and how every sentence has meaning and might be drawn up later. GJ! Faith restored yet again Cassie Clare!

Have you guys read it? What did you think? Looking forward to Clockwork Princess (anyone know when this one is supposed to release?) and City of Heavenly Fire. If you haven’t, this book and this series is a must read! Check it out.

Updated: February 5, 2015

City of Fallen Angels....City of Fallen Expectations

City of Fallen Angels (The Mortal Instruments, # 4)

By: Cassandra Clare

Expected Publication: April 5th 2011 by Simon & Schuster Children's, Margaret K. McElderry

424 pages

Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy, Paranormal

Source: Personal Library

( Goodreads | Amazon | Book Depository )

*Note: The above links to Amazon and Book Depository are affiliate links. Affiliate links support giveaways for Somewhere Only We Know readers.

Goodreads description--The Mortal War is over, and sixteen-year-old Clary Fray is back home in New York, excited about all the possibilities before her. She’s training to become a Shadowhunter and to use her unique power. Her mother is getting married to the love of her life. Downworlders and Shadowhunters are at peace at last. And—most importantly of all—she can finally call Jace her boyfriend.

But nothing comes without a price.

Someone is murdering Shadowhunters, provoking tensions between Downworlders and Shadowhunters that could lead to a second, bloody war. Clary’s best friend, Simon, can’t help her—his mother just found out that he’s a vampire, and now he’s homeless. When Jace begins to pull away from her without explaining why, Clary is forced to delve into the heart of a mystery whose solution reveals her worst nightmare: she herself has set in motion a terrible chain of events that could lead to her losing everything she loves. Even Jace.

Ok...I have to say, I was not happy at all with this book. I'm a Cassandra Clare fan, but this book just didn't measure up to me. I felt closure with the characters and their story lines after the City of Glass, but opening them back up just feels unsatisfactory to me. I felt it was predictable, which I'm beginning to really HATE about a book/story. Even the parts where I felt like she was trying to create some intrigue just felt forced.

Things I liked: the ties from Clockwork Angel into this series, Simon and Isabelle's relationship, at this point, that's all I've got.

Jace and Clary were completely unsatisfying to me in this story. The ending obviously set up the next book, but I don't like it. Sorry. 3 Stars...that's the best I can do.

Updated: July 7, 2018