If you haven't read The Mortal Instruments and The Infernal Devices yet, I highly suggest you do before you start The Dark Artifices. There will be so many interconnecting stories and plots you won't fully appreciate unless you have. I haven't read Tales from the Shadowhunter Academy yet and wish I had before reading this because I hear there are some storylines that would have also connected into Lady Midnight. I plan to rectify this immediately. Slight spoilers ahead for all the Shadowhunter books that have come before this.
Where to begin...
I'll start with Emma and Julian and their forbidden parabatai love. We saw it coming in City of Heavenly Fire. Like a car crash that you just can't look away from. I adore Julian and how strong he is. He is so young, but from the age of twelve became a parent to his four younger siblings. He was forced to grow up way too fast, but he did it to keep what was left of his family together after the Dark War ripped them apart. We also find out that since Uncle Arthur is a lunatic (per Shadowhunter terms) that Julian has also been running the Los Angeles Institute since he was twelve. That is a lot of stress on a person so young. His only outlet has been his secret love for Emma. Emma is a kick ass shadowhunter who reminds me of Buffy merged with Jace. She's strong and snarky and I just love her confidence in her own skills. She has finally developed the same feelings for Julian, but per the parabatai curse, since it is true love and they are parabatai they will develop warlock powers? Become super, power hungry shadowhunters who will destroy everyone around them? This is not looking good. The only thing this makes me think of is when Jace had the mark on him tying him to Sebastian and Clary cut through it. We know that Cortana can cut through anything. So I have this image in my head of Emma using Cortana, which is one of the Great Swords, to cut their parabatai runes so they can be romantically involved. I don't know if that is possible, but it's what I picture happening in my head.
Next, the younger siblings. I love that even though there are a ton of Blackthorn kids they are all so unique and have such different personalities that they each are interesting to read about in their own right. You never find yourself bored with their side stories or hoping to get back to the more main characters. You grow to love them and want to know what's going on with them too. Livvy and Ty are the twins who are just two years younger than Julian, but he treats them like children and acts like he's an adult. They are fifteen and he's just seventeen. Livvy is so fiercely protective of all her siblings, especially Ty, that it's hard not to picture her growing up to be a total badass herself. Ty, who is described as different, reminds me of someone who may have high functioning autism. He is so capable though and throughout the story he tries to prove himself to Julian, who only wants to protect him, but in fact is keeping him too sheltered. Then we have Dru, who is thirteen, but looks older than she is and has curves she shouldn't have yet. This presents a different kind of worry for Julian and rightfully so. Side note with Dru...did anyone else get vibes from Perfect Diego like he might be a possible romantic interest for her down the road? Lastly, we have the baby, Tavvy. He is seven and mostly quiet, but when he does speak he drops bombs on you. It's like they all forget he's there most of the time because he's always quietly playing or sleeping in a corner, but he is listening to everything they say and absorbs it all. Then all of a sudden he's like I know some important stuff and they are all just shocked. I love them all and can't wait to see their side stories continue in the series.
Cristina and Perfect Diego. Well, once we learned about the betrayal of Diego's brother, Jamie, who was meant to Cristina's parabatai, it makes sense why she ran away. I think Diego will end up being a stand up guy and part of Cristina's love triangle with Mark. More on that later. I just love Cristina's BFF vibe with Emma and how they can confide in each other. She has this calm, cool, and collected demeanor that nicely balances Emma's quickness and snark. I love when she says she wishes she could be parabatai with Emma and I feel like this is foreshadowing what will eventually happen. I think if Simon could go from mundane to vampire to Shadowhunter to Clary's parabatai...then these two will end up parabatai later on down the road as well.
Mark...I love Mark! Initially I thought Mark was gay as we learned of his relationship with Kieran. Then we learn that he also likes girls. I just love the diversity we get in Cassandra Clare's books. We have several gay characters, we have different races, different abilities (See Ty), etc. Now we have a bisexual character who is going to cause so much chaos and I can't wait. He is so wild and he really connects with Emma in a way even Julian can't. Her free spirit recognizes the same wildness in his and you can see how they have genuine understanding of that aspect of each other. I don't think it's true love like she has with Julian, but I do see them developing real feelings for each other. This is another love triangle involving Mark I need to talk about...with Emma! So after learning about the parabatai curse, Emma decides that she has to end it with Julian so they don't hurt those they love. She tries, but he's so determined to make it work that the only solution she can think of that she knows will hurt him enough to make him stop trying to pursue her is to date Mark. She know he said that was the one thing he couldn't come back from. But, when Emma proposed this to Mark as a favor and he shuts the door and says why lie? I literally could not wipe the stupid smile off my face for ten minutes. I know he will likely end up with Cristina (and maybe in some brother husband situation with Kieran and Cristina? She did say she felt desire in seeing them kiss. Just saying), but in the meantime, this is one I ship hard.
Moving on to Malcolm Fade. I saw this coming when Magnus first showed up at Malcolm's house and made the comment about how Malcolm and Catarina Loss had experimented with fault lines and then made the side comment to Emma about the convergence. That was the first inkling I had that he was going to end up being the Guardian. Then when he showed up at the Institute to help the kids against the Followers, it all seemed a little convenient how Sterling just randomly died when no one was touching him. Sounded like warlock magic to me. It does make me sad for him, but also afraid of what Annabel is going to be like now that she's back from the dead. Is she going to try to avenge him now? Will she hate her extended family like he did because her immediate relatives, who are long since dead, killed her. Will she want to take it out on the current generation of Blackthorns? So many questions are left with this. I am glad that Jem and Tessa are looking for his body and the Black Book, but shouldn't they be enjoying their lives together now? I know that's not exactly Malcolm related, but that's where that train of thought took me so I went with it.
Kit...the lost Herondale! I had a feeling in the prologue that he would end up a shadowhunter by the end, but I had no idea he already was one. I want to know if Johnny Rook was the Herondale or if it was his mother since we still don't know who she is. Will she end up being someone we already know? It is going to be interesting watching him try to learn to be a shadowhunter at fifteen just like Clary had to. I like that Ty is sitting by his door and feel like maybe having another boy his own age around will be good for Ty instead of just having Livvy all the time. I can't wait to see how his story plays into the rest in the way that only Cassandra Clare can weave different storylines together. It's a beautiful talent of hers. I'm thrilled that we get to see little snippets of our beloved characters from TMI and TID in this series as well. Again, hats off to the master of story weaving!
Diana, while she wasn't such a huge part of this book, has something she's hiding. I for one am really intrigued to find out what exactly she isn't telling the kids. There has to be some big plot twist associated with her and her secret that is going to play into the rest of the story. She seems to genuinely care about the Blackthorn/Carstairs kids so it has to be major for her not to have taken over the institute to help them.
I think that about covers my thoughts on this book. I know this was long, but there was just so much greatness that I needed to gush over. This was a fantastic first book in a series. I admit it did take me a while to get into it, but by the second half I flew through it. I felt like in the very beginning I would find myself wondering about the characters from TMI and TID every time they were mentioned and want to know what was going on with them instead of being able to really invest in Emma's story. However, maybe 100 pages in I was fully invested and caring about our new(ish) cast of characters. The bottom line is that I can't wait for the next book!
Do any of you have any predictions for the books to come? Did you see any of the plot twists coming? Let me know in the comments.
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