“We are all the pieces of what we remember. We hold in ourselves the hopes and fears of those who love us. As long as there is love and memory, there is no true loss.”
The Mortal Instrument series has its enjoyable traits, but has held on to its definite flaws. This last book rid itself of most of them - no more back and forth relationship tug-of-wars and little angst in comparison to the others. It highlights the series strengths - complicated moves from the villain, twists in betrayals, well written action scenes, and even a tragedy or two.
Clare shows why shades of grey villains work better than black and white ones. Sebastian's twisted interest in his sister, the clouded background of his upbringing, his egotistical dialogue, and of course the ultimate goal to destroy the entire world and watch it burn.
Clary stands on her own strong feet. Jace is still overrated but with a lot of the angst removed between his relationship with Clary, he's more manageable. He still has personal angst, but apparently that's just his style. Not sure what I think of a major Simon change but I guess it's to fit into the author's future plans with the series branch out in the Shadowhunter Chronicles. And finally I like Isobell a little more in this one over the others.
Magnus and Alec were always my favorites in this series - I enjoyed their scenes in this book together, but the final ending seemed to be missing a little something. Magnus was sick a lot of the time so his pizazz seemed to be missing.
I didn't care about the sudden new additions and kept skimming through all their scenes. We've been with the same characters through five books, so why add so many news one that we're supposed to care about in the sixth book?
The scope of the created world seems larger and more all-reaching with this book as the group has to voyage to different grounds for their many battles. Overall this book has a lot of tightly-knitted action scenes, wraps up most of the loose threads, shows the shadowhunters for being the weak ruling society they are in the end with their silly decisions, and merges together almost all shipped couples finally.
Not a perfect book but definitely the best in the Mortal Instruments series.
Book Quotes:
“Temper us in fire, and we grow stronger. When we suffer, we survive.”
“There are memories that time does not erase... Forever does not make loss forgettable, only bearable.”
Book Trailer:
Similar Reviews:
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
![]() |