Shadowhunters and Downworlders: A Mortal Instruments Reader(52)

The portrayal of all these untraditional families and strange friendships conveys this: Blood doesn’t matter. Tradition doesn’t matter, and following the accustomed forms and rules of family doesn’t matter. Love is what matters. Love is the song you hear even while you sleep, and you know you are healed, and safe, and where you belong.

So what does all this talk about love and desire and strangeness really mean, in the larger scheme of things rather than in the personal-opinions arena? (Example of a possible personal opinion: “I Read This Book of Essays and I Really Think Sarah Rees Brennan Is a Demented Sex Fiend.”) I’m not saying: These books are a lot about desire, keep them away from children! I’m saying: These books are a lot about desire in all its forms and about not condemning it, and I think that’s valuable for teenagers—for everyone.

Let’s examine what Cassandra Clare has actually done, through this addressing of love and desire. She’s written one of the very few (I count two1) young adult books with an Asian character important enough—Jem Carstairs, via being one of the romantic leads—to get his own cover, to hit the bestseller list (Clockwork Prince). She has written what I would say is the most popular gay relationship in the whole YA fiction realm. And is popularity important? Yes, yes it is. A book is more likely to be popular if it’s heteronormative; it means there are fewer obstacles in the book’s way (stores and festivals refusing to stock the book, less fancy marketing for the book). Consider how nobody’s gay that we know of in Twilight or the Hunger Games… consider Dumbledore being revealed as gay—but not, crucially, in the books themselves—in Harry Potter. Think about what a book being popular really means. (It doesn’t mean the author gets to buy a golden helicopter.) It means that a lot of people read it—a lot of people get the message that, for instance, gay relationships shouldn’t exist by reading books where they don’t exist. I wish none of this were true, but it is; and since it is, I’m so happy that Cassandra Clare’s books are in the world, and that they have been so wildly successful and beloved.

Cassandra Clare has achieved an enormous amount, because she’s been able to send out this message to so many readers: Whoever you are, whatever you want—it’s okay, and you are okay. You can be better than okay: You can be a hero.

We need more scandalous books by deviant wenches to tell us that.



Sarah Rees Brennan was born and raised in Ireland by the sea, where her teachers valiantly tried to make her fluent in Irish (she wants you to know it’s not called Gaelic) but she chose to read books under her desk in class instead. She is the author of Team Human and the Demon’s Lexicon trilogy. Her new book is Unspoken, a romantic Gothic mystery about a girl who discovers her imaginary friend is a real boy.

1 Lili Saintcrow’s Betrayals, sequel to her Strange Angels, is the other. You’re welcome, curious reader!





ABOUT THE EDITOR

#1 New York Times bestselling author Cassandra Clare created the Mortal Instruments in 2004 with City of Bones (Simon & Schuster, 2007). Since then, the series has grown to five books, with a sixth due in 2014, and been joined by two spinoff trilogies and an upcoming film starring Jamie Campbell Bower and Lily Collins. Clare’s books have earned her numerous awards, including the American Library Association Teens Top Ten Title.