City of Bones by Cassandra Clare

City of Bones 
by Cassandra Clare

[Good props: tattoos, (your own, a student’s) books on tattoos and what they mean]

Let’s set the stage for you. You’re name is Clary and you are 15. You get into the nightclub Pandemonium. You notice a boy with blue hair (not so unusual in this place) follow a very attractive girl in a white dress. You notice two dark shapes following the blue haired boy. You watch the couple sneak into a side room. You look again and realize that the dark shapes are really two boys and you see one of them pull out a long knife out and follow the couple.

What is happening? [Give the audience a chance to guess that this is—obviously—a murder and read page 8 where Isabelle declares her name until he is killed.]

Obviously he was killed, but who was he? And who is Isabelle? All Clary knows is that she has seen a murder. And possibly by kids who are into demons, maybe a cult of some sort? No, they are in fact, demon killers, and Clary has just admitted that she can see them, which is something a “mundie” can’t do (I know, shades of Harry Potter and muggles!)

THIS is no Harry Potter, however. Clary’s mother is kidnapped by the demons and put into a coma; Clary joins the “Shadowhunters” which is dark and dangerous; she finds a strange attraction to one of the Shadowhunters just as her friend Simon announces his love for her. But never fear—it is not a romance either! With werewolves and of course mind-sucking librarians (aren’t we all??); this book will keep you on the edge of your seat!

(Booktalk by Mary Jo Heller, Einstein Middle School)