The Shadowhunter's Codex

By Cassandra Clare and Joshua Lewis

Blurb: 
The Clave is pleased to announce the newest edition of the Nephilim’s oldest and most famous training manual: the Shadowhunter’s Codex. Since the thirteenth century, the Codex has been the young Shadowhunter’s best friend. When you’re being swarmed by demons it can be easy to forget the finer points of obscure demon languages or the fastest way to stop an attack of Raum demons. With the Codex by your side, you never have to worry. 

Now in its twenty-seventh edition, the Codex covers it all: the history and the laws of our world; how to identify, interact with, and if necessary, kill that world’s many colorful denizens; which end of the stele is the end you write with. No more will your attempt to fight off rogue vampires and warlocks be slowed by the need to answer endless questions from your new recruits: What is a Pyxis? Why don’t we use guns? If I can’t see a warlock’s mark, is there a polite way to ask him where it is? Where do we get all our holy water? Geography, History, Magic, and Zoology textbook all rolled into one, the Codex is here to help new Shadowhunters navigate the beautiful, often brutal world that we inhabit. 

Do not let it be said that the Clave is outdated or, as the younger Shadowhunters say, “uncool”: this new edition of the Codex will be available not only in the usual magically-sealed demonskin binding, but also in a smart, modern edition using all of today’s most exciting printing techniques, including such new features as a sturdy clothbound cover, a protective dust jacket, and information about title, author, publisher, and so on conveniently available right on the cover. You’ll be pleased to know that it fits neatly into most satchels, and unlike previous editions, it rarely sets off alarm wards. 

The old woodcuts and engravings have been replaced as well: instead, you’ll find lavish modern illustrations by some of the brightest luminaries of the fantastic. Creatures, weapons, people, and places have been carefully and accurately rendered by the likes of Rebecca Guay, Charles Vess, Jim Nelson, Theo Black, Elisabeth Alba, and Cassandra Jean. Chapters are beautifully introduced by the drawings of Michael Kaluta, and along with our condensation of the classic 2,450-page tome, A History of the Nephilim, you will find a selection of the best of the lovely illustrations of that volume by John Dollar. 

This edition of the Codex will be available in Institute libraries and what mundanes sometimes call “book stores” in October 2013.

Review: 
This book was just amazing. As always, it lived up to my expectations for Cassandra Clare. It was really nice to get back into her usual stuff compared to The Red Scrolls of Magic.

This book was very informative about the Shadowhunter world, you learn all sorts of different things and read about several things that we are already aware of from reading her main series. 

There was quite a few drawings to go along with a few things so that we don't have to imagine them ourselves and that we could actually see how Cassandra Clare imagined them. This made things a lot more interesting because everyone's imagination is different so it's nice to see the authors interpretation compared to ours.

Throughout this book; Simon, Clary and Jace have written notations and reading some of these are actually really funny. You can tell their different personalities from each other and some of the stuff they say just makes you remember the good times within The Mortal Instruments.

There isn't really much to say about this book apart from that it is wrote in the same style as The Mortal Instruments, with the same humour and it's very informative. It is fast paced and really enjoyable, I'd definitely recommend reading it if you like her other work. I'm really disappointed that it has taken me so long to get round to reading it.

Favourite Character: Simon

Read: 25/07/19 - 26/07/19

5 stars out of 5

Written by Sammie