City of Bones

I had two of my most avid reading students introduce me to this series. They were reading through it at about the same time and would come to class early to grab the extra reading time, and worked feverishly to finish their assignments to get back to the book, and this continued until they had read the entire trilogy. Of course, I was intrigued.

This is a book about Clary, short for Clarissa, who goes out to a club one night and witnesses a murder that no one else can see. The person killed disintegrates before her eyes, and when security shows up with her friend, Simon, they cannot see the three people responsible eventhough they are standing right in front of them. But she soon finds out she isn't supposed to be either. She starts to learn about the Shadowhunters, beings trained to kill the demons that come up from the underworld. Then Clary has a fight with her mom, goes out with Simon, sees one of the murders, discovers her mom has gone missing, and realizes that she may have a part to play in this world after all.

This is fantasy for people who aren't just in it for the love story. It is high action, has brilliant ideas, involves vampires, demons, monsters, werewolves, dimension doors, hidden clues and the pacing is incredible. This book is addicting, intriguing and I basically didn't move on to the second because I already had plans with my kids that night and had to sleep. Clare's writing is very smart, never gets cutesy, and I'm completely hooked.