Lady Midnight, by Cassandra Clare

Hey, all! 

I just finished reading Lady Midnight, by Cassandra Clare! 

I know, it took me absolute ages to get to this series! Especially for someone who loves Cassie Clare's work as much as I do... To tell you guys the truth, I tried reading this book already last year, but got bored 200 pages in, so stopped ^-^. However, with the recent release of Lord of Shadows, I just had to try again, as part of my Shadowhutners Re-read, for the Young Adult Dome I write for, and just for my own interest. 

If you guys want to see my reviews for all other Cassandra Clare books, you'll be able to find them at some point today up in the reviews tab! I'm taking the time today to refresh that page, finally! 

A parabatai is your partner in battle. A parabatai is your best friend. Parabatai can be everything to each other—but they can never fall in love.

Emma Carstairs is a warrior, a Shadowhunter, and the best in her generation. She lives for battle. Shoulder to shoulder with her parabatai, Julian Blackthorn, she patrols the streets of Los Angeles, where vampires party on the Sunset Strip, and faeries—the most powerful of supernatural creatures—teeter on the edge of open war with Shadowhunters. When the bodies of humans and faeries turn up murdered in the same way Emma’s parents were when she was a child, an uneasy alliance is formed. This is Emma’s chance for revenge—and Julian’s chance to get back his brother Mark, who is being held prisoner by the faerie Courts. All Emma, Mark, and Julian have to do is solve the murders within two weeks…and before the murderer targets them.

Their search takes Emma from sea caves full of sorcery to a dark lottery where death is dispensed. And each clue she unravels uncovers more secrets. What has Julian been hiding from her all these years? Why does Shadowhunter Law forbid parabatai to fall in love? Who really killed her parents—and can she bear to know the truth?

So I have loads of thoughts about this book. Overall it was good, especially towards the end! However I feel like the first half was slightly loose and messy. So far, Cassandra Clare has written series in such a way that her first installments are slightly weaker than the rest of the series, before publishing an explosive finale. This introduction to The Dark Artifices (You guys have no idea how many times I think the Artificial Devices, it keeps mixing up!) was quite strong and very different from her other introductory novels. In Lady Midnight, our main character, Emma Carstairs, already knows everything about Shadowhunters, their laws and histories. In that sense the only thing that needs to actually be introduced is the family and their situation. Now, this gave us a fresh perspective on things: they didn't have to explain the world again, which was something I think was really needed. 

This book had a lot going on through it: Emma is investigating her parent's murder, Julian is taking care of his many siblings, and around all of that there is a pot of its own that advances through the book. I had a little bit of a hard time adhering to the plot but it got better, again, towards the end.

This book definetley has its place in the Shadowhunter book collection. It has great supporting characters, and goes deeper into the Shadowhunter universe. We have a new branch of Shadowhunters called the Scholomance who do all the research and have secret information, and who have a different fighting pattern. This book also teaches loads about Fairies, as well as dark magic, which were both very interesting to learn more about!

This is all I can really talk about without delving into spoilers! So if you haven't read it yet, make sure to come back once you have! If you have, read on! :D 

Ok let's do this one 'thing' at a time. 

The book opens with this guy called Kit, the son of Johnny Rook, a mundane who knows about the shadow world. It was a confusing way to start because you never hear about Kit again until halfway through the book. But at the end, Tessa and Jem show up, kind of out of nowhere, and announce that Kit is actually... 

Johnathan
Christopher
Herondale

I actually gasped and closed my book in shock! There's another Herondale and he has the same name as Jace and he's going to be protected by Jem and THERE'S ANOTHER HERONDALE!? I was not expecting it, at all. I thought Johnny was maybe some half-fey or something, but never a Shadowhunter! I cannot wait to see how that plays out!! 

Also, in this book, we are introduced to a warlock called Malcom Fade. He's a hopeless romantic who is sweet and funny, who hangs out with the Blackthorn family, watches movies with them, and kicks demon butt with them. He has this way of talking that reminds me a lot of the gods in Percy Jackson. And then he ended up being the bad guy of the book... That killed me! I mean you can sort of understand why he wanted to revive Annabel, his old love, and why he hated the Blackthorns - because they killed her. But it still really upset me that he would turn on them like that! However, I highly doubt he's dead. Cassie glossed over that much too quickly. Plus he's a warlock, isn't he supposed to be hard to kill? 

Now, Emma. Emma wasn't my favorite. She was rebellious and snarky, but has a way of talking that made her sound like a side character, or someone who was trying too hard to be in the loop of things. Her parabatai is Julian. One of the big plot points in Lady Midnight is her and Julian admitting that they love each other - which is agains the Parabatai law. At the end of the book, Jem told Emma that when two parabatai are in love, they have warlock-like magic, that can be consuming and maddening, which is why it is against the law. Again I'm not convinced by the maddening part, so I'm looking forward to seeing how that plays out. 

Additionally, at the end of the book, Emma goes to Mark, asking if they can pretend to be together to trick Julian. Mark turned and replied that they didn't have to pretend, chichis freaking me out a bit! We'll see. 

Back to Julian, he's really nice, but really intense. He'll suddenly go to Emma and say something brute and harsh, or recklessly start kissing her. At the end he managed to spin a whole lot of lies to get his family out of trouble, arresting an innocent vampire instead. (Vampire who's using 'addictive demon powders' in his pizzas which made me laugh until yin fen crossed my mind... Please don't eat the pizza, Jem!) Something's up with him, and I really want to know more about it. 

Mark is kind of strange - I mean he's completely in character, having come back from a land where things are totally different than what he remembers, but I felt like it dragged out for a bit too long. I really ship him with Christina, though! Despite the whole Kieran and Diego thing I really think they could be good together! Christina is also amazing, I can't wait to know more about her. 

The plot of this series is interesting so far - the blend of necromancy, murder and their connection to Sebastian and his story is something I'm interested in reading more about! 


There is so, so much more I could talk about - if you want to talk about anything I missed please put it in the comments! I'd love to talk to you about it! 

I'm giving this a 4/5 feathers! Fun reading experience, but, as expected, many loose ends.

Have a great day! 
Stay bookish!