Clockwork Angel is the first book in Cassandra Clare's series: The Infernal Devices, which is a prequel to her first series The Mortal Instruments. Based in London, this book follows Tessa in the year 1878, where she descends into the dark supernatural world, looking for her missing brother Nathaniel. Tessa realizes that her only allies in this journey are demon-slaying Shadowhunters and not too long after, they find themselves after the Pandemoniom Club; a secret organization filled with vampires, demons, warlocks and humans ready to out rule the British Empire, Tessa and her allies are the only ones who can stop them.


I loved this read so much.

Lately, I've been really drawn to the Shadowhunter world. City of Bones really threw me off because I really didn't like it. But once I progressed with the series, it started to get a lot better for me.

On Cassandra Clare's website, she wrote the order you should read all these books in and I've finished the first three books in The Mortal Instruments series and now onto The Infernal Devices before I finish up TMI.

Right off the bat, this series is so much better than The Mortal Instruments. Although I'm starting to love TMI more than I did when I started, I feel like Clockwork Angel was an amazing intro book for a series. It's written so well, and the characters are amazing.

There really isn't anything negative I can say about this book. I guess the only problem I had was that there is a lot of characters in this book. I'm a really visual person when it comes to characters. It's really hard for me to visualize what people look like (which is how I keep track of them) so when there's a lot of characters, I try to look up fan art or something, but it was hard to find art for a handful of characters like Agatha and Camille. So I was so confused when they mentioned someone who wasn't the main: Tessa, Will, Jem, Charlotte, Henry, Jessamine.

Other than that, I loved this book so much. I love the characters I can remember though. I think Will might be my favourite of them all (New book boyfriend? Possibly.) I loved this little banters with every character. I really need to stop loving every angsty male character, but he made me laugh so much with his sarcastic remarks and witty jokes towards everyone and everything. Absolutely relatable.

Tessa herself, was a way better female lead than Clary, I thought. Definitely an improvement in my opinion. I thought Clary was annoying until City of Glass, whereas, I really love Tessa from the first page we meet her. (Which is technically page one.)

Typically, there were scenes, like for example when Tessa became way too trusting of her brother (which we find out, is actually an antagonist in this novel) where I'd be really annoyed with the main character, but I really wasn't for Tessa. I truly felt like she didn't see it coming and honestly, neither did I. I think she actually used her brain a lot more than most female main characters do - which is annoying that authors write them that way, but that's just my opinion.

Jem is also an incredibly precious character. I think his sweetness, and understanding personality really evens out Will's sassy, angsty personality so the duo themselves are perfect. Also, I love how much Jem and Will care about each other. I know they're Parabatai, so I guess they kind of have to, but I love them so much because of their relationship on their own.

Everyone in the institute just had a really close relationship which I loved and understood each other perfectly. I noticed that with all of Cassie's books. I say it all the time and I'll forever say it; I really wish I was a Shadowhunter. The world and everything is so brilliant.

Speaking of worlds, I think Cassandra Clare does an amazing job with world building. I even admit it with The Mortal Instruments, I love that she takes our own world with real life places and puts a fantasy twist on it. One of my favourite elements of Urban Fantasy is that, because it's based in our world, I tend to appreciate it more. We can walk around the different areas of New York that The Mortal Instruments has mentioned and the same for London.

For example, I've only been to the UK once when I was young, but I could pick apart certain places that they mention in this novel. I also love how theres a scene where Jem takes Tessa to the Blackfriars Bridge which is actually a real place in London, so I thought that was really cool.

I really liked the plot twists in this book as well, like the whole Magister situation where we all thought it was de Quincey but sike, it's actually Mortmain. Yup, I was shook as well.

I just overall enjoyed this book. I feel like, because it was written so well and it was so easy to be engulfed by the content, I didn't even realize I was reading a book. I felt like I was with these characters on their missions. I felt the need to hug Will while he's drinking Holy Water, trying to get the vampire blood out of his system, or hit Nate in the head with every possible object at the Institute for treating Tessa the way he did. I felt like I was with these characters, experiencing everything and I think that's why I love this book so much, and this world as well.

I honestly don't want to read any other book right now, just Shadowhunters books because of this. It's so hard to find this strong of a connection to certain characters (okay, not really, but still) I just want to spend as much time as I can with them.

Whats your favourite Shadowhunter rune? Let me know in the comments or on my Instagram!