Book review 6: City of Lost Souls, Cassandra Clare

City of Lost Souls (The Mortal Instruments #5) by Cassandra Clare

Things to know:

 

• I read the original English version
• It was published May 2012
• It has 535 pages
• It is set in New York 2007 (directly after book 4)
• I started: 8th January 2015 and ended it: 26th Jan

So, first of all, some of you might have noticed how long it took me to read this. For me in 95% of the time you can see how much I like a book on how quickly I get through it... Guess how catching this one was?

Okay, but some contents first. After Jace disappeared with Sebastian, the Clave prioritize to find Sebastian. Clary and the others found out though, that there is a very strong bond between the two boys, which causes them to feel each others pain meaning; kill one, the other dies too. The Clave would kill either of them just to get rid of Sebastian, after all Jace is only a common Shadowhunter to them.
Then one night Jace and Sebastian turn up in Clary's room and ask her to come with them. Luke gets badly hurt trying to protect Clary and Jocelyn, while Jace and Simon disappear again. At the same time Alec, Magnus, Izabelle, Simon, Maia and Jordan are also trying to find Jace before the Clave does, bending some laws doing so...
After Clary gets a hold on special Fairy rings with which the people wearing them can communicate with each other mentally. She gives one to Simon and then she goes off, and hopes Jace will take her with him, which he does...

Back to my opinion; After I finished book 4, I really didn't want to read the next one, but I gave it a chance reading the first few chapters... At some point I started re-reading some books I loved and read ages ago and only read CoLS on my 10min train ride to uni... And I never really got into the book, it had some interesting moments, but nothing really catchy. I only finished this so "quickly" because I had night-shifts this weekend, and after I finished all my shift tasks I would always read until the next costumer came. And then, finally, the last 3 or 4 chapters were a great read, especially the epilogue was awesome. A lot of things happened, things that actually are interesting to me.
The problem with this series is, that somehow the story turns its self in circles. Clary and Jace are in love, but can't be together, it's boring! Yes, I will read the last book, to finish the story, but I'll take a short break and read the "Bane Chronicles" first, as for now it seems to be more fun :)

Okay, I know, this time I was very negative, but that's just how I read this... I hope this wasn't too bad for you to read.

Lisa~

Mail Week: 4

So, another mail week is over, this time I received 2 letters and 4 postcards :)

Sarah, USA

Karen, USA

Anne, Finland

Lily, Thailand <3

Postcrossing, Belarus

Janina, Germany (though I gave her the card to sent it to me ages ago xD)

This is all for this week, I hope I'll be able to add a new book review soon, but "City of Lost Souls" really takes me a long time to read...


Lisa~

Kawaii shopping :3

So, I went looking for Japanese magazines in German online shops, my favourite being me-shop.net, (they do worldwide shipping and their page is in German/English/Japanese) and they had a sale of Lolita accessory books.

Here is what I just HAD to buy:

 Angelic Pretty Agenda, + free postcards from Kamijo and Scandal

 This is the Agenda from inside, though every month looks different :3

 Liz Lisa Stationary Set

 Inside: Liz Lisa Magazine, pen, stickers, mini notebook, pen case and deco tape.

 

 Baby The Stars Shine Bright Fleece blanket book

 Inside: booklet

 Inside: fleece blanket, can be worn as poncho-like-thing though, with cute hood >.<

 mezzo piano backpack book

 Inside: booklet

Inside: backpack (big enough to fit school-stuff in, including A-4 sized books)

it has cute ears :3
 

 Innocent World Kasa (Umbrella) book

 inside: booklet

 inside: umbrella

umbrella opened <3

The backpack "book" was most expensive, the rest was between 10€ and 13€. I am really happy :D

Lisa~

Mail Week: 3 (+qensio info)Yuk

This week was a better mail week :)

3 letters, 2 postcards and one small parcel!

Jennifer, USA

Keiko, Japan

Vicky, Germany

Czech Republic, Postcrossing

Taiwan, Postcrossing

Yuki, Japan

Lucky me :3

 ____________________________________________________

Also since a few months I am a member of qensio, a company checking how long mail takes to be delivered. People from large cities can register there and decide which kind of mail they want to receive (eg. I unchecked the box for insured mail. I don't want to pickup/ sign to receive mail every other day).  For me it went like this: First I received mail from Germany (about 10 letters or so) which I registered (similar to postcrossing) on the page. But everything is explained in the letters you received. Since end of November I also receive international mail, and some of the stamps they use are AWESOME. 

From Middle Earth xD

But the stamps you receive aren't even the best part. For each mail you register you get a certain amount of points (for normal letters it's 9 points) and you can  swap them for items in their shop or for vouchers, 200 points are a 10€ voucher for Amazon. I already got one and it really works!
For registration you receive 100 points.

Sooo.... if you live in a big city and want to receive some more great stamps or just some Amazon vouchers, this might be an idea for you ;)


Lisa~

Book review 5: The Shadowhunters' Codex by Cassandra Clare and Joshua Lewis

 The Shadowunters' Codex (The Mortal Instruments & The Infernal Devices) by Cassandra Clare and Joshua Lewis

English Version

German Version

Things to know:

• I read the (translated) German Version
• It was published February 2014
• It has 320 pages
• I read this on 9th January 2015

You can read this book with no fear of spoilers after you read book 4 of "The Mortal Instruments".

This book is a Guide to the Shadowhunter world. It is supposed to explain the way of a Shadowhunter to a person who is in training to become one. It gives you information about weapons, martial arts, demons, downworlders, angels, geography, etc. At the same time Clary, Simon and Jace put some notes into it to actualise it, Clary asked Luke for help on some info about Werewolf and even Magnus Bane added 2 really sarcastic pages to this Codex.




When I read about this book, I was hoping for something different then I actually got. Yes, I was hoping for a Codex written for Shadowhunters, but I thought that Clary and the others would write more into it. There are pages without any notes from one of them or others with just some sarcastic notes next to it. The improved comments of Clary and co were there, but I wished there would have been more input.
Also this seems to address a child. Yes, the series is supposed to be for (young) teenagers, but honestly, the Codex is supposed to be for Shadowhunters, people who train to kill - mostly demons. I don't think it's really realistic to make it sound as if the readers are children if they are training to be soldiers...

The sketches inside are awesome, many different artists worked on this. Some of the discussions Clary, Jace and Simon have in this book are just absolutely funny. I had moments were I couldn't stop laughing. 
But the information of the Codex itself was very dry, and I have to admit, I skipped some bits of it...
Some more sketches for the demons and angels would have been great. Or maybe Luke, Magnus, Alec and Izzy actually writing into it as well would have been fun too


Is this a must to read?
Definitely not!
But if you are a fan and want to get some extra info, go on and read it :)
Though, most information shouldn't be new to the reader as long as the actual series carefully.

On goodreads, I only gave 2 out of 5 stars, because of the reasons named above. If not for the awesome artworks, I would probably only have given it one.

Lisa~

Mail Week: 2 + short travel notice :)

This wasn't a good mail week for me... only 3 (belated) Christmas cards... and that's it!

Astrid, Germany

Lily, Thailand

 Thank you for all those awesome stamps Lily <3

Manon, Belgium

Now to my travel notice:

On 5th March I'll fly to Thailand to visit Lily again.
I bought the flights on Christmas via Lufthansa for ~750€ which is, at least from Lufthansa, the cheapest I found around that time.
On the way there I'll have a stop in Bangkok, on the way back in Singapore.
I'll be back home on 20th March, meaning, I'll be actually annoying Lily from 6th to 19th... let's see if we'll hate each other after living together for about 2 weeks xD

I will upload loads of photos from Phuket!!

Lisa~

Book review 4: City of Fallen Angels, Cassandra Clare

City of Fallen Angels (The Mortal Instruments #4) by Cassandra Clare

Things to know:

 

• I read the original English version
• It was published April 2011
• It has 424 pages
• It is set in New York 2007 (6 weeks after book 3)
• I started: 7th January 2015 and ended it: 8th Jan

I would really advice you to read the Infernal Devices series before you read the book. It is not absolutely needed, but it will make it a better read for you and answers questions like:
Why does Brother Zachariah look different than the other brothers?
or
Who is Will?


After the Mortal War was won thanks to Clary, she came back to New York. Finally she can be together with Jace, which both are enjoying a lot! At the same time her mother and Luke are planning their wedding, Alec and Magnus are travelling together (sending funny photos to Jace) and Simon is dating... both Maia and Isabelle. Everything should be fine, but Jace is having strange dreams which make him distance himself from Clary, Simon has to leave his home, because his mother thinks he is a monster, Jocelyn finds out about a woman who left her child alone in a side street and Alec learns about parts of Magnus's past.



As you might have noticed, there is a lot of messy things going on and nobody is really happy. I was hoping that after book three at least Clary and Jace would have a somewhat stable relationship. But no, they don't. I've read (urban)fantasy novels in which a couple gets together, and then for the following books, is happily together (with normal relationship problems) and these books are still great. There don't always have to be on-off relationships to make a story interesting. Of course, this is my opinion, and I bet there are people around who like these kind of relationship, but making this last over a series as long as this one is making me not want to carry on reading it.



SPOILER STARTS
As I know how book 4 ends, I also know that in book 5 Clary and Jace will still not be happily together, and I really don't want to pick up the book... I have moments like these sometimes, when I think the series or book isn't promising anymore, but it usually doesn't happen in between books.
Spoiler Ends



Excepts for this, it took me a while to get into the book (again), but I mentioned this problem in this series before... 

I don't want to write more at this point, as the novel ends somewhere in the middle of a story.

Lisa~