Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Spotlight Series: The Mortal Instruments

Cassandra Clare was born to American parents in Teheran, Iran and spent much of her childhood travelling the world with her family, including one trek through the Himalayas as a toddler where she spent a month living in her father’s backpack. She lived in France, England and Switzerland before she was ten years old. Since her family moved around so much she found familiarity in books and went everywhere with a book under her arm. She spent her high school years in Los Angeles where she used to write stories to amuse her classmates, including an epic novel called “The Beautiful Cassandra” based on a Jane Austen short story of the same name (and which later inspired her current pen name).

After college, Cassie lived in Los Angeles and New York where she worked at various entertainment magazines and even some rather suspect tabloids where she reported on Brad and Angelina’s world travels and Britney Spears’ wardrobe malfunctions. She started working on her YA novel, City of Bones, in 2004, inspired by the urban landscape of Manhattan, her favourite city. She turned to writing fantasy fiction full time in 2006 and hopes never to have to write about Paris Hilton again.


Cassie’s first professional writing sale was a short story called “The Girl’s Guide to Defeating the Dark Lord” in a Baen anthology of humor fantasy. Cassie hates working at home alone because she always gets distracted by reality TV shows and the antics of her two cats, so she usually sets out to write in local coffee shops and restaurants. She likes to work in the company of her friends, who see that she sticks to her deadlines.


My love of The Mortal Instrument series came as a complete surprise. It was yet another highly hypes series I didn't believe would live up to the expectation. The world-building was phenomenal and the characters immediately drew me in. I read the first three books in rapid succession and am impatiently waiting the next installment.

Important Characters to Know
Clarissa "Clary" Fray - Shadowhunter raised as human.

Jace Wayland - Orphaned shadowhunter, living with the Lightwoods.

Simon Lewis - Clary's human best friend.

Alec Lightwood - Oldest Lightwood sibling. Shadowhunter. Gay.

Isabelle Lightwood - Middle Lightwood sibling. Shadowhunter. Described as beautiful.

Magnus Bane - High warlock of Brooklyn. Bisexual. Dating Alec. 800 years old.

Luke Garroway - aka Lucian Graymark. Clary's mother's best friend and a father figure to Clary.

Valentine Morgenstern - Powerful and evil shadowhunter. Main bad guy.

The Mortal Instruments
(in reading order, links lead to my reviews)
  1. City of Bones
  2. City of Ashes
  3. City of Glass
  4. City of Fallen Angels
If you like the Mortal Instruments series, you should try:
The Wicked Lovely series by Melissa Marr
The Infernal Devices series by Cassandra Clare
The Immortals series by Alyson Noel
The Evernight series by Claudia Gray
The House of Night series by P.C. Cast
The Blue Bloods series by Melissa de la Cruz
The Vampire Academy series by Richelle Mead

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