Cassandra Clare - Chain of Gold.

Cassandra Clare – Chain of Gold.

Rating: 10 out of 10.

Hi everyone! Two posts in one day, I was a bit eager. I wanted to talk about Chain of Gold by Cassandra Clare. I love every piece of work she puts out, the Shadowhunter world she has created is phenomenal and it deserves every single bit of its success. I had this book pre-ordered the minute I was able to and had so many expectations for it. I’m so happy to say it exceeded even my wildest dreams. This book is the first 10 out of 10 I will be posting about. Of course this is my own opinion, please leave a comment or send me a message with what your thoughts were on the book, I’d love to know.

As always, there are going to be spoilers throughout this, so if you haven’t yet read it and hate spoilers, come back after you have had a look. If you need any more convincing to add it to your reading list, here is some more spoilerless information.

“Cordelia Carstairs is a Shadowhunter, a warrior trained since childhood to battle demons. When she travels to London, she encounters childhood friends James and Lucie Herondale and is drawn into their world of glittering ballrooms and supernatural salons. All the while, she must hide her secret love for James, who is sworn to marry someone else. But Cordelia’s new life is blown apart when demon attacks devastate London.

Trapped in the city, Cordelia and her friends discover that a dark legacy has gifted them with incredible powers – and a brutal choice will reveal the true cruel price of being a hero.”

Having already read about Tessa, Will and the gang in The Infernal Devices I was so excited to delve back in and read about their lives as adults as well as meet their children. My expectation was for the children to be little mini copies of their parents. This wasn’t necessarily a bad thing as I loved the parents, but it was a concern that the book would be really repetitive of The Infernal Devices. This wasn’t the case. We were introduced to a whole new range of characters, each with their own personalities that are so different from their parents. Not to be mistaken though, we do see little similarities such as the Herondale children and their love for literature like their parents. The way their individuality was displayed is commendable. James and his forever having his nose in a book, or his vulnerability when it comes to his warlock heritage. Lucie with her story writing, and her desire to be close to her friends and parabatai. Cordelia and how she wants to be more than just a woman to be desired, but a warrior and a hero. Christopher stood out so much with his science experiments and Thomas and his gentleness. Matthew with his outward flamboyance and love of extravagance, but his deeper inner struggles. Alastair pushing people away and being a bully when deep inside he just wants to be liked and loved. And Anna, her ability to be herself out in the open in a time when being who she was wasn’t as accepted as it is now. Just to name a few examples. I fell in love with the complexities of each of these characters and how together they all fit like a lock and key.

Further to this, the diversity of the characters is something that can be noted as a huge success for Clare. She manages it in every book, to create characters that a wide majority of people can relate to on different levels.

The Shadowhunter world is a universe that Clare has brought to life, the entire saga is mind-blowing, it has everything you could want from a book; good, evil, drama, romance, fantasy, adventure, action. There isn’t anything not to love. I also admire that there is so many books in this franchise, yet each one is different. Each storyline is unique and nothing is recycled or recycled to the point of boring the reader. It is always exciting.

The storyline of this book was unlike any of the books that came before it. We followed James, Lucie and the gang against the threat of demons that were ending people’s lives such as the life of Thomas’ sister Barbara. We follow the gang as they find the threat and try to put an end to it, whilst Christopher (with a little help) whips up an antidote to the poison that is killing Shadowhunters. It turns out the threat is coming from James and Lucie’s maternal grandfather. Tessa’s demon father. Belial. His motives? To get James to agree to using his body as a host body. As they are flesh and blood this is possible. James and Cordelia manage to eliminate this threat at the end of the book and the antidote is administered. My only questioning is how is it that in all of the Shadowhunter books the teenagers can work out the problems before their fully trained and experienced parents. I suppose this does lead to it being more dramatic though.

The other plot of the book is that of James and Cordelia’s ‘engagement’. We see James and Cordelia display their feelings for one another throughout the book, but as we know, James has intense feelings for Grace due to the enchanted bracelet she asked him to wear for her and has promised to one day marry her whilst under the bracelets influence. Not that James realises this. When he took the bracelet off, he kissed Cordelia as part of a rouse in the whispering room. They both got way too into it though, which suggests to the reader that they were both more than happy to be there. Then the bracelet gets slapped back on and he’s back to being a member of the Grace Blackthorn fan club. To throw things off again, at the end of the book he ends up engaged to Cordelia, just not the way we were all hoping it would happen.

James burnt Blackthorn Manor down to the ground at Grace’s request and was going to be caught and punished for it. To stop this from happening, Cordelia gave the false alibi that James was in her room with her all night. However, because of the time period of the book this was seen as unacceptable behaviour, and after this comment Cordelia would not have been able to attract a suitable husband and be seen as ruined (I know! Times were whack). To avoid this they came up with the arrangement that they would marry for a short period of time and live as friends, and then in a year they would divorce (which was somehow seen more okay then having a boy in your room, but okay sure) and live their separate lives. This avoided James being punished, and Cordelia being ‘ruined’.

This was not how I, as a reader, was hoping they would be together. But we still have hope as we know James is under the control of Grace’s bracelet. So who knows what could happen. I have my fingers crossed for them to actually be in love and live happily ever after (I’m a sucker, I know). I have so many hopes and expectations for Chain of Iron, out early 2021 (already pre-ordered to no surprise) and I can’t wait to be transported with the next installment of The Last Hours.

I will never not love Cassie Clare and her extraordinary talent. There will be so many more posts with my thoughts on her books. I may edit this one to add more in but I’m very conscious of the fact that I could write on forever if I include everything I want to. Look out for more Clare on my feed! I will always recommend her books to everyone no matter who they are, there is something in there for everyone.

If you’ve gotten this far, thank you. I’m enjoying writing and sharing my thoughts more than I ever thought I would. Setting up these accounts for myself was the best thing I have done in a long while. I like to think I’m encouraging people to read whilst getting to know like-minded people, and this makes me so happy. Happy reading everyone!

Stay Curious!

J x