281. Chain of Thorns (2023) by Cassandra Clare

“Cordelia Carstairs has lost everything that matters to her. In only a few short weeks, she has seen her father murdered, her plans to become parabatai with her best friend, Lucie, destroyed, and her marriage to James Herondale crumble before her eyes. Even worse, she is now bound to an ancient demon, Lilith, stripping her of her power as a Shadowhunter. After fleeing to Paris with Matthew Fairchild, Cordelia hopes to forget her sorrows in the city’s glittering nightlife. But reality intrudes when shocking news comes from home: Tatiana Blackthorn has escaped the Adamant Citadel, and London is under new threat by the Prince of Hell, Belial. Cordelia returns to a London riven by chaos and dissent. The long-kept secret that Belial is James and Lucie’s grandfather has been revealed by an unexpected enemy, and the Herondales find themselves under suspicion of dealings with demons. Cordelia longs to protect James but is torn between a love for James she has long believed hopeless, and the possibility of a new life with Matthew. Nor can her friends help—ripped apart by their own secrets, they seem destined to face what is coming alone. For time is short, and Belial’s plan is about to crash into the Shadowhunters of London like a deadly wave, one that will separate Cordelia, Lucie, and the Merry Thieves from help of any kind. Left alone in a shadowy London, they must face Belial’s deadly army. If Cordelia and her friends are going to save their city—and their families—they will have to muster their courage, swallow their pride, and trust one another again. For if they fail, they may lose everything—even their souls.”

⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐

23 Books In 2023 – Book 6 of 23

Content Warning: Graphic alcoholism, death, addiction. Moderate violence, grief, sexual content. Minor miscarriage, homophobia, pregnancy

I don’t even know how long it has been since the last Shadowhunter book was released, meaning that I don’t remember everything from it, and that I went into this book kind of half blind, in a sense.

Chain of Thorns is the last book in The Last Hours trilogy, and I finished it feeling kind of underwhelmed. I don’t know what I expected from it, and while it was a good ending to the story, I think I just wanted a bit more. There was also a lot less death than Cassie’s (she/her) previous final books, which is refreshing to read. This being said, however, her previous final books have been a lot stronger than this one was.

Speaking of the death in question, it could have so easily been avoided had Cassie not obviously needed to kill someone off. While there are a huge amount of characters in this book, I do like them all, so of course, I was not happy with who she killed off, and I did think she was going to kill someone else in a later chapter which I was scared for, but it never happened in the end. This character’s death did seem very lazy, and in her previous books, there is a lot of mourning, and even a whole ritual that Shadowhunters do for their deceased, so this death felt very wuickly done; no mourning, no ritual. Kind of disappointed.

I don’t know if the reason so many people have negative things to say about this book is because of how long it took to release, or the lack of interest when it came to the characters. They all felt rather bland in this book, and there was a lot of arguing, for clear reasons, but it just got boring and repetitive, it’s a long book, and I couldn’t be bothered with so much pettiness.

Yes, this is the end of another story, so obviously it needed to end on a happy note, but it did feel rushed to the point that there didn’t seem like enough had happened from the point of action to the one chapter we got of people being happy. I don’t know. There’s just something about this one that I didn’t love, which is a first for these books, and I hope the next draws me back in to the world of the Shadowhunters, whenever that may be.

All the love,

Jade x