My favourite book from the past year is Ghosts of the Shadow Market by Cassandra Clare. It is a novella from the Mortal Instruments series and follows around a side character (Jem Carstairs) as he visits Shadow Markets around the world. It’s a fictitious book in which Jem (aka Brother Zachariah) travels around and learns secrets and stories about other people’s lives. He is on the hunt for a relic from his past as a Shadowhunter and along the way, he ends up helping many other people with their troubles.
Personally, I love this book because it is so different from the way Cassandra Clare writes the rest of her books. At first, I picked it up because I had read the rest of the Mortal Instruments series and was curious to see how this one would be like, and I was very surprised when I actually started reading it because it was not at all what I was expecting. The story-line was so interesting and different from the clichés the author normally uses, and I loved how it followed around a side character rather than one of the main ones. I could clearly see the character development in Jem, as well as the people he helped and gave advice to.
I think that this story is one that should be read as a teenager or slightly older, just because the themes covered in the book can be slightly dark and there is a lot of violence and death in it. However, the book isn’t all morbid as there is also romance and friendship in the story. It’s also a really big book and isn’t the easiest to follow at all times since there are so many things going on, it can be a bit hard to keep track of what is happening in each story.
I enjoyed being able to learn about the backgrounds of different side characters who you know exist, but you don’t really know much about in the actual series. It was interesting to see how Cassandra Clare created the character arc for each of them and made them all unique and different. Overall, this is a really good read for someone looking for unique characters as well as anyone who loves fantasy.
Insightful Riya, and detailed!
What do you think your choice of books says about your identity? Can you see any issues linked to the ideas of representation we have started to consider?