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City of Bones (The Mortal Instruments, #1)

Cassandra Clare

Start date: April 1, 2013

Finish date: April 30, 2013

Discussion: Group Read

Why we're reading this: April 2013 Group Read
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What Members Thought

Jun 26, 2013 Claudia rated it liked it

Shelves: young-adult

I've just read this book again. I had read it some time ago - before I joined Goodreads - but I wanted to find out for myself exactly where the film had gone wrong. I didn't remember so many mistakes in the book.

After reading it a second time if I could give it another half-star I would - some of the setting and description is purely magical - but unfortunately not a whole star, so it stays at three. Nevertheless it has a rattling good and entertaining plot, strong central characters in Clary an I've just read this book again. I had read it some time ago - before I joined Goodreads - but I wanted to find out for myself exactly where the film had gone wrong. I didn't remember so many mistakes in the book.

After reading it a second time if I could give it another half-star I would - some of the setting and description is purely magical - but unfortunately not a whole star, so it stays at three. Nevertheless it has a rattling good and entertaining plot, strong central characters in Clary and Jace and some very witty dialogue. So if you like fantasy and a good, fun read, you should definitely read it.

The main reason why the film is a disappointment is mostly about the love story between Clary and Jace. In the film it comes in pretty much immediately and becomes as big as the main plot (the quest for the Mortal Cup), so much so that it almost swamps it, whereas in the book it comes in later and is very much a sub-plot. This makes the film feel soppy, and at times down-right cringey - there were several of us from time to time in the cinema hunkered over in our seats wishing we could disappear.

In addition, having messed around with the plot, the filmmakers were so desperate to keep the great one-liners that they put them in at inappropriate times. Some dialogue also only works on the page. It didn't help that Collins as Clary, though stunning, seemed to deliver sarcasm as straight dialogue. It will be a long time before I can wash myself clean after her delivery - chest heaving - of "is this the part where you start tearing off pieces of your shirt to bind my wounds?" It was like something out of a bad bodice-ripper - eek! - or a 1970s Hammer House vampire film, and nothing like the delivery by Clary in the book.

Finally, the film flattens the complexity of the villain Valentine's character. From cruelly cold with flashes of uncontrollable anger he becomes simply demonic. And in the process removes much of what makes him interesting, and utterly chilling. In fact the whole of the end of the book is simplified. Probably it's to keep the film under 2hrs, but it's replaced with something that looks copied straight from Percy Jackson, which doesn't fit with the book at all.

Sigh! The film really didn't do Cassandra Clare justice. She deserved much better. So did the rest of the caste, who did well with a bad script. This is a delightful book - though I have to admit first time through I did find the Oedipal twist at the end a bit hard to stomach. I'm so glad I read it again. If anything I enjoyed it even more the second time, and I suppose I must be grateful to the film for that! ...more

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