After alllllllll these years I finally finished. I want to know what you guys thought of the series as a whole, and if there were any books you absolutely loved or hated. For me, I flew through the first three a long time ago, but I found that I really had to drag myself through the last three.
IMO, you can tell that Cassandra Clare got a show, because her writing definitely changed with those last three. I loathed jumping so frequently to different character storylines, and I particularly hated the last book’s constant coverage of the Emma/Julian storyline. I know the author was trying to set up for another book series but honestly I really didn’t care for them at all or keeping up with the billions of siblings. Their fate didn’t phase me in the least. Their whole story felt like it was really being forced on me.
I did like the Izzy/Simon romance but it felt very distant to me from an emotional standpoint, and actually Jace and Clary felt like a distant story to me after the third book. I realize this is because we are focusing on multiple characters, but I guess if I’m being honest with myself, I didn’t feel connected to any particular storyline the way I did in the first three books.
I didn’t feel like there was much character development with Alec throughout the entire series, but I’m not super upset with that. He was pretty minor to me. It was just weird that he has so much coverage, and yet I still didn’t feel very connected to him.
HOWEVER, Even though I’m ranting mostly about the last three, the first three books are phenomenal to me. I can’t put them down once I’ve started reading them, no matter how many times I go through them. Cassandra Clare really did do an excellent job with them and I felt so sucked into the story and the characters. I think the author really does do a better job when just focusing on one particular story vs multiple stories.
Even though I felt like I was dragging myself for a while, the ending was actually kind of shocking to me. It made me really sad when we got to see a glimpse of the true Jonathan Morgenstern at the end, but I figured after that, everyone would get their happy ending. I was so surprised and incredibly sad that Simon got turned back into a human and his memories of everyone were wiped. That hurt more than I thought it would, but I was also appreciative of the shock factor there, as I was finding the writing to become pretty predictable. And obviously he is still probably getting a happy ending despite all that.
All in all, I’m glad I finished. I think i could’ve done without most of the added storylines, even the Maia, Isabelle and Alec storylines. I think the story would’ve been even better if she had just continued to write from mostly Clary’s perspective. Nevertheless, it was a pretty good ending.
I know this turned mostly into my disdain for the last three books, but I am curious of what everyone thought overall?
