City of Bones

City of Bones is the first novel in Cassandra Clare's Mortal Instruments series and the first novel set in the Shadowhunters universe.

Plot Teaser
Clary Fray and her best friend Simon Lewis are out for an evening at a club in New York City. They expect a night of fun; they do not expect to witness a murder. The murderers are three teenagers with strange tattoos and stranger weapons -- and the body disappears into thin air.

The "murderers," Clary soon discovers, are people called Shadowhunters whose job it is to hunt demons. The murder Clary witnessed was not of a person at all, but of a demon. In this discovery, she is introduced to Jace Wayland, a beautiful but rude Shadowhunter, and his adoptive siblings, Isabelle and Alec Lightwood.

Clary intends to just move on with her life, but when she is attacked by a demon and her mother disappears, she is forced back into the world of Jace and demons. The Shadowhunters cannot figure out why she is able to see them or why a demon would be after ordinary people like Clary and her mother, but they are determined to find answers.

Characters

 * Clary Fray, a girl
 * Simon Lewis, her best friend
 * Jace Wayland, a Shadowhunter
 * Isabelle Lightwood, a Shadowhunter
 * Alec Lightwood, a Shadowhunter
 * Valentine Morgenstern, a rogue Shadowhunter
 * Luke Garroway
 * Magnus Bane, a warlock

Adaptations
A film adaptation of City of Bones was released in 2013, starring Lily Collins, Jamie Campbell Bower, and Robert Sheehan. A TV series, titled Shadowhunters, is scheduled to start airing in 2016, starring Katherine McNamara, Dominic Sherwood, Matthew Daddario, Emeraude Toubia, and Alberto Rosende.

Series and Sequels
City of Bones is the first book in the six-part Mortal Instruments series. It is followed immediately by City of Ashes. It is also the first novel (in publication order, not chronologically) set in the Shadowhunters universe.