City of Ghosts: Volume 1 (City of Ghosts, #1)

by Victoria Schwab

• ISBN13: 9781338111026
• Publish Date: 3 September 2019 (first published 28 August 2018)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: Scholastic US
• Format: Paperback (US Trade)
• Pages: 320
• Language: English

Reviews

[Quirky Cat]

I know I am very late to the game, but I finally sat down to read City of Ghosts by Victoria Schwab. I'm trying to read through her whole backlog, and thus far, I have loved everything I've tried. City of Ghosts is the first novel in the Cassidy Blake series, a young adult/middle-grade series following a girl who can see ghosts.

Cassidy Blake's parents are a ghost-hunting duo, which is a bit ironic. You see, they can't see ghosts. But their daughter can. Not that Cassidy has been quick to tell anybody her secret. In fact, only her best friend knows the truth, and he won't be telling anyone anytime soon.

Her parents just got the ghost-gig of a lifetime, signing on for a new show called The Inspectors. Their first stop is Edinburgh, one of the most haunted places in the world. How will Cassidy cope with seeing this many ghosts?

“Embrace your strange, dear daughter. Where’s the fun in being normal?”

City of Ghosts was a fun and oddly endearing introduction to the life of Cassidy Blake. There is something utterly charming about her story – and I can't quite put my finger on why. Perhaps because it reminds me of a show, I used to love growing up? (Any guesses?)

I'm only one book into this series, and I can already tell that more than meets the eye about Cassidy – and her powers. The same could be said about her best friend, Jacob. I'm dying (perhaps not the best term here) to learn more about what is happening there."

“Stories have power," she says. "So long as you believe them.”

This is the perfect ghost story for readers who love the supernatural – but aren't looking for something super gory or terrifying. It has the right amount of haunting vibes without going too far. This also happens to make it perfect for a broad range of audiences, including middle-grade readers, young adults, and anyone else interested (myself included).

There is one thing that dates the release of City of Ghosts – all of the Harry Potter references, and boy, are there A LOT of them. So if this is a subject you're actively trying to avoid at the moment, I have bad news for you.

When deciding to read City of Ghosts, I went with an odd combination. I read it, and I listened to the audiobook narrated by Reba Buhr. Buhr did a fantastic job, not only with Cassidy's voice but Jacob and everyone else as well. It made the experience all the more entertaining. So much so that I believe I'll be following this combination for the rest of the series.

Read more reviews over at Quirky Cat's Fat Stacks

[emilybettridge]

Cute story! Very quick read. I hope to see more character development as the series continues. I love the premise of the book, which is why it didn’t get 3 stars!

First of, middle grade is not my usual age category of reading and you may see that reflected in my review unintentionally.

This was a very good book. Very atmospheric, interesting, and characters that I actually cared about. Then why the three stars? I found the red raven too much of a generic evil character. Victoria Schwab is a phenomonal author and I believe that she could have written a more intersting evil character than the one which has intentions that are overused in so many stories.

I'm not sure if she stayed true to certain legends / myths, but if that is the reason than she made a good choice. However, I still believe that it was a bit too generic. (Or I read the wrong stories when I was growing up)

[alisoninbookland]

-Reminds me of Coraline
-Hurray for involved (and alive!) parents.
-MG books are great because boys and girls can be friends without there being ~tension~ or hints of romance. As a result, I loved Cassidy and Jacob's friendship.
-Loved all the Harry Potter references.
-The setting was delightfully spooky. Perfect read for October/Halloween.
-Any idea if the ghosts mentioned are real stories/legends?
-The book ends in a way that the story could be a stand along.
-It's not, obviously.
-What's going to happen?? Please don't let Jacob turn evil.
-I enjoyed the story but I didn't love it.
-I've never been overly wow-ed by anything I've read by Schwab.
-Granted the only other story by her I've read is The Archived.
-It's enjoyable but not enough to make me actively seek out more of her other books.
-This was a great audiobook.
-I'll have to pick up Tunnel of Bones on audio if I choose to continue the series.

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[pamela]

I understand precisely zero of the love that Victoria Schwab’s City of Ghosts seems to get. This book failed to entertain on almost every conceivable level – from its unoriginal plot, through to its constant cross-referencing and clichés. I’ve heard so many good things about Victoria Schwab’s fantasy works, but given that this was my first book by the author it’s put me right off.

The plot of City of Ghosts is incredibly simple. Cassidy Blake is a girl who sees ghosts. Her parents research the paranormal, despite having no experience with it themselves. Her parents are given a television pilot to film in Edinburgh about local legends and ghost stories, so they go there and Cassidy experiences some ghostly activity, with a rather generic ‘big bad’ thrown in at the end just to make sure there was some semblance of a plot. That’s really all there is to it. None of the characters were interesting, well developed, or seem to show any interest or curiosity in what is going on around them, and the prose was practically bursting at the seams with Harry Potter references shovelled in like so much shit.

She bounces off with all the enthusiasm of someone rushing toward cake, not corpses.

“But it’s middle-grade fiction,” I hear you cry. “It’s not for you.” But that’s where you’re wrong. There have been so many amazing middle-grade novels written that tackle exactly this subject matter but with so much more dedication and entertainment value. Ironically, Harry Potter, which is so heavily referenced in City of Ghosts, is one of them. But the incredible Lockwood & Co. series, which I possibly love even more than Harry Potter, is another. Honestly, if you’ve never read it, let that be the one series you read this year. You won’t regret it. Children are discerning readers, and they deserve better than flat characters and even flatter plotlines. The mark of a well-written middle-grade story is if adults can enjoy it just as much.

Cassidy Blake as a character was flat and two dimensional. City of Ghosts is narrated in first-person, and yet the reader is never given a sense of who Cassidy is as a person. Most of her observances are either vague or non-committal in an attempt to artificially create a sense of mystery, and the rest of them are literal references to Harry Potter or pointing out how common words differ in British and American English. A good portion of the dialogue was dedicated to that, and it was just lazy writing. The difference between a ‘flat’ and an apartment, or ‘chips,’ ‘crisps’ and ‘french fries,’ is as easily conveyed through context as it is through blatantly pointing it out. It wasn’t cute or endearing, and it just made Cassidy come across as pretty vapid. She seems to have exactly no curiosity about her abilities or about the ghosts that she can see. Her near-death seems not to have affected her in the slightest. Not once does she question the why or how of her reality, she simply accepts it and goes about her day as if it’s completely normal.

Our memories change, too. (For instance, I swear the teddy bear I had growing up was green, but according to my parents it was orange.) But when you take a photograph, things stay still. The way that they were, is the way that they are, is the way that they will always be. Which is why I love pictures.

The side characters were basically just there to create the skeleton of a plot and got no development of their own. Cassidy’s parents were clichés, and their paranormal research didn’t seem to develop the plot at all except to act as a catalyst to take Cassidy to haunted places. It all just felt a bit convenient that the girl who can see dead people has paranormal investigators for parents – even though she never discusses her abilities with her parents, the only people on the planet who would be the most likely to believe her. Her best friend, Jacob, is a ghost, and he obviously has some kind of back story and ulterior motive, but this was never really discussed, and so obviously dangled as an incentive to read the next book that it just irritated me. Lara, the other ghost hunter, was just there. She literally had no development which was such a disappointment. She obviously knows a lot, but she just turns up, conveniently tells Cassidy what she needs to know and then says her goodbyes. She is obviously going to show up in future books as the whole ghost and veil plot develops, but she needed a little more in City of Ghosts for me to be drawn in to want to learn more. She acts as a plot device, and not an actual character.

Most of City of Ghosts is just Cassidy walking around, looking at ghosts (only looking mind, no interaction at all), talking about how much she loves Harry Potter, and thinking Scottish Culture is totally adorable (but only actually engaging with it in how it relates to Harry Potter). None of this is enough to sustain my interest or rate this book as anything other than ‘meh’. It was a ghost story that wasn’t scary, and a novel that was essentially plotless. Too many plot points were mentioned and not developed, and too many characters were introduced who were nothing more than plot devices. For all the wonderful things I’ve heard about Victoria Schwab as a writer, for my first book of hers, City of Ghosts was definitely a disappointment.

[Djilan]

I loved it! I really liked the way it's written, Cass telling us and Jacob replying on it as though she was telling him, not us :D
Good story, can't wait for the second book :)

[Stephanie]

This review was originally posted on Once Upon a Chapter



I have to giggle a little bit when it comes to City of Ghosts by Victoria Schwab. You see I first took interest in it because the book community was all abuzz pre-release day. Then after it was released all of that intensified. I giggle because I own seven, yes seven, books by Schwab that are currently unread. City of Ghosts comes along and BOOM! I've read my first Victoria Schwab book. (It helps that it was a gift. :))

I really, really enjoyed Cassidy Blake, her parents (who yes! are an active part of the book!!), Jacob, and the people they meet while in Edinburgh. Schwab had this way of effortlessly writing characters. I'm almost two weeks removed from finishing the book and there were no awkward character introductions and I remember each one. Her characters were full-bodied and memorable. It made the story flow so well.

And what a story it was! City of Ghosts by Victoria Schwab was original without being too far out there. I've really been into the ghost type stories lately and this book fit in nicely. Middle grade is not my typical go to but I really enjoyed this one. So much so that I have pre-ordered the second book in the series.

I liked the local lore that Schwab injected into City of Ghosts. Cassidy and Jacob had a great friendship and it was nice to see a book for children showing a male/female friendship without romance or a crush confusing it. I liked how the Blakes were active parts in the book and in their daughter's life and not relegated to spending the entire book off page.

If you have a tween in your life who needs a good book (heck even if you're a 34 year old married woman!) City of Ghosts is a fantastic place to start! Now if Schwab's young adult/adult novels are as good as her middle grade, I have a few treasures in the TBR waiting!

[girlinthepages]

There's something about City of Ghosts that drew me to it, despite my black sheep status as being one of the only bloggers and readers I know that didn't enjoy perhaps Schwab's most well known book, A Darker Shade of Magic. Perhaps it was the eerie quality of the cover artwork, the decidedly dark premise for a middle grade novel, or simply the fact that it features a pale girl with long dark hair who's a little different than kids her age and has a cantankerous cat (basically how my 11 year old self would like to have glamorously and self-indulgently pictured me if I were the star of a middle grade novel). Though I missed the opportunity to grab the title at YALLWEST this year, when I saw it available on Scribd I figured it was the perfect, short (only about 5 hours) audio book to keep me in the spooky fall mood in October/November.

I will be the first to admit that I rarely read middle grade novels, so many of the critiques I may have are likely based on the fact that it's a genre I'm not too used to reading. City of Ghosts no doubt has a middle grade feel, with semi-easy resolutions to dark plot elements, characters who are a tad one dimensional, and a protagonist who tells rather than shows more often than not. However, these elements aren't criticisms of the actual writing, rather I recognize that it's the middle grade structure that allows younger readers to start learning the nuances of reading a more complex story. When I overlooked these issues, I did find City of Ghosts to be rather charming. I loved Cassidy's "Yeah-I-Can-See-Ghosts-After-A-Near-Death-Experience-And-No-One-Believes-Me-But-Oh-Well" nonchalant attitude (it seemed very 90's TV show to me), her loveable but sometimes oblivious ghost-hunting parents (oh, the irony) and her eternal middle grade optimism despite all of the obstacles that are thrown her way, from having to give up her summer beach vacation to hunt ghosts in cold and rainy Scotland to finding out her life may have a larger paranormal purpose. It's all very charming and realistic while still balancing a very unrealistic paranormal premise.

Now I've never been to Scotland, but I think Schwab was able to capture the atmosphere and setting extremely well, from the pretty much chronically haunted town to the locals who just go with the flow when presented with paranormal activity. I could clearly picture the castles, cobblestone streets and the (admittedly terrifying) Mary's King Close (which I Googled to learn more about and let me tell you it's not for the faint of heart, 10/10 would believe it's haunted). I have no idea what the plans are for the next book but I love the idea that Cassidy and her parents may travel around to a different "City of Ghosts" in each book to explore hauntings- 5th grade Cristina would have been ALL ABOUT THAT (and still is TBH).

The story was actually pretty bleak when you get right down to it, with a really creepy, child stealing ghost who manages to get into a situation of sorts (vagueness is on purpose so I don't spoil anyone) with protagonist Cassidy and she has to of course go toe to toe with the ghost to fight for good/save herself + others. She does so with the help of her trusty ghost BFF side kick (who's motives you may begin to question which is a whole other issue) and another paranormally gifted character who also teaches Cassidy she has great responsibility and purpose due to her paranormal gifts that she needs to come to terms with.

I'm glad I experienced this story via audio because I feel it did keep the story moving at a good pace (I listened at 1.2x speed) and kept me from getting board and perhaps putting it down had it been a psychical book (the plot itself wasn't boring, there were just some parts where it felt very MG-ish that might have made me loose some steam). It was also easy for my to ignore some of the pop culture references that probably would have had me rolling my eyes a bit otherwise (there's a LOT of Harry Potter references and yes, I love HP as much as the next person but it felt a bit heavy handed). I also really liked the narrator- she made Cassidy sound very earnest but also naive and sometimes hesitant which I think is the perfect tone for an 11 year old who can see dead people.

Overall: A solid middle grade novel that's not afraid to take on darker themes or spookier premises. I sincerely hope we get to travel to another international (and haunted!) location with the Blake family in the next book!This review was originally posted on Girl in the Pages

[Briana @ Pages Unbound]

Initial Thoughts: The book is fine. It's very capable middle grade. Some young readers might find it a bit too creepy or morbid, while others are fascinated by these things, so definitely something to think about when giving it to a child. This is my first Schwab book, after hearing so much hype about her, and my biggest impression is that the book is just alright. I can't think of anything immensely wrong with it, but it doesn't strike me as being that different from other good middle grade books I've read, nor would I say it even has a highly original premise. I believe Schwab can write, but her other books must be different/better if people are really obsessed with her. I will have to give her adult novels a chance.

[jesstheaudiobookworm]

4★ Audiobook⎮You see the part of the synopsis that recommends this for fans of Stranger Things? I zoomed in on that part and immediately started listening without even realizing this was a middle-grade story. Admittedly, I don’t have the best record with middle-grade stories and Victoria Schwab is usually hit or miss with me anyway. But I will say that my listening experience improved significantly once I realized that City of Ghosts was written for middle-grade children.

That realization occurred about 50% through the audiobook and it nullified nearly all of my complaints up to that point. Perspective is everything.As a middle-grade book, this was actually pretty great. It was certainly better than those I’ve heard in the past. I think I even liked it better than the Miss Peregrine series and I definitely liked it better than the Percy Jackson series.

It also didn’t hurt that the audiobook was only five hours long. So when I finally realized what I was hearing, I was already 2.5 hours in, with another 2.5 to go. That, plus the fact that I am currently 8 books behind in my Goodreads challenge, heavily factored into my decision to finish this book. When you’re that far behind and the end of the year is quickly approaching, short, fast-paced books are the way to go! City of Ghosts was a super easy listen and, once I made up my mind to push through it, I was finished in no time. This could easily be heard in a day.

A lot of that had to do with Victoria Schwab’s writing. Schwab wrote the protagonist, Cassidy, in such a way that her age wasn’t that obvious. I was pretty surprised to find out she was only 12 years old! I’ve read stories with teenage and adult protagonists who were way more immature than Cassidy. She didn’t go around making nonsensical choices that left me rolling my eyes and she wasn’t a whiny brat.

Let me put it this way: If all middle-grade books were written this well, I wouldn’t be as wary of the genre. I’m not saying this was fantastic or the best thing I’ve heard this year, but it was better than I expected it to be. If I were recommending middle-grade audiobooks for an adult, City of Ghosts would be atop my list. With that said, I’m still undecided about whether or not to continue with this when the next installment is released. City of Ghosts wasn’t a bad listen considering my circumstances, but I don’t know if I would voluntarily return to the middle-grade genre. But, then again, I won’t rule it out entirely…

Narration review: City of Ghosts was my first-time hearing Reba Buhr narrate. Before I realized this was a middle-grade audiobook, I thought Buhr’s narration sounded a tad bit juvenile and just a little overdramatic for what I assumed was a YA audiobook. But after realizing the audience for which it was intended, Buhr’s narration seemed most appropriate. In fact, she had a lot to do with my positive assessment of Cassidy’s maturity level. Along with Schwab’s writing, Buhr’s narration made Cassidy seem older than 12 and much more likable. Even the extra vocal flair she provided seemed fitting for a middle-grade audience. I think it actually helped keep my attention too! ♣︎