Book Review :: Ghosts of the Shadow Market, by Cassandra Clare (and co)

Ghosts of the Shadow Market by Cassandra Clare
ISBN: 1406385379
Series: Shadowhunters
Also in this series: Chain of Gold
Published by HarperCollins, Simon & Schuster
on 2019-06-04
Genres: Fantasy, Paranormal, Short Stories, Supernatural, Young Adult
Pages: 624
Source: HarperCollins NZ
Find at Harper Collins NZ
Goodreads

The Shadow Market is a meeting point for faeries, werewolves, warlocks and vampires. There the Downworlders buy and sell magical objects, make dark bargains, and whisper secrets they do not want the Nephilim to know. Through two centuries, however, there has been a frequent visitor to the Shadow Market from the City of Bones, the very heart of the Shadowhunters. As a Silent Brother, Brother Zachariah is sworn keeper of the laws and lore of the Nephilim. But once he was a Shadowhunter called Jem Carstairs, and his love, then and always, is the warlock Tessa Gray.

Follow Brother Zachariah and see, against the backdrop of the Shadow Market’s dark dealings and festive celebrations, Anna Lightwood’s first romance, Matthew Fairchild’s great sin and Tessa Gray plunged into a world war. Valentine Morgenstern buys a soul at the Market and a young Jace Wayland’s soul finds safe harbor. In the Market is hidden a lost heir and a beloved ghost, and no one can save you once you have traded away your heart. Not even Brother Zachariah ...

Last updated on 23 January 2026

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A brief look at Ghosts of the Shadow Market

If you’re familiar with Cassandra Clare’s Shadowhunter world, then you’ll be aware of a few short story compilations that she and others have created over the years, as additional tales to sit alongside the main story-lines. The Bane Chronicles is one of them, a collection of 11 short stories which follow the Warlock Magnus Bane, and Tales from the Shadowhunter Academy (10 short stories mostly following Simon Lewis) is the other. Enter Ghosts of the Shadow Market, and we have another compilation of 10 stories, centred around Brother Zachariah/Jem Carstairs.

Each of the ten stories in Ghosts of the Shadow Market are spread across time, with the overarching theme of Brother Zachariah/Jem Carstairs trying to find the Lost Herondale, a child in the Herondale line thought to be dead when actually they were rescued and moved countries – the line of lost Herondales thereafter is what Jem is searching for. Each is co-written by Clare and another author.

1. Son of the Dawn, by Cassandra Clare and Sarah Rees Brennan
2. Cast Long Shadows, by Cassandra Clare and Sarah Rees Brennan
3. Every Exquisite Thing, by Cassandra Clare and Maureen Johnson
4. Learn About Loss, by Cassandra Clare and Kelly Link
5. A Deeper Love, by Cassandra Clare and Maureen Johnson
6. The Wicked Ones, by Cassandra Clare and Robin Wasserman
7. Through Blood, Through Fire, by Cassnadra Clare and Robin Wasserman
8. The Land I Lost, by Cassandra Clare and Sarah Rees Brennan
9. The Lost World, by Cassandra Clare and Kelly Link
10. Forever Fallen, by Cassandra Clare and Sarah Rees Brennan

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My thoughts on Ghosts of the Shadow Market

This has got to be my favourite of the short story collection so far. I really liked The Bane Chronicles because it was all about Magnus and he’s a star, and I really love Simon too, so Tales from the Shadowhunter Academy was fun. But Ghosts of the Shadow Market really shot ahead for me. I think it has to be because of Jem Carstairs.

The Infernal Devices I enjoyed more than The Mortal Instruments, and that was partly due to the fact that it was set in the late 1800s and was a little steampunk too, but it was mostly because of the characters. Tessa Gray, Will Herondale and James ‘Jem’ Carstairs are top notch characters, so whenever they pop up in other Shadowhunter stories it makes my day. A whole book with Jem as the central thread weaving throughout? Yes.Please.

“I sometimes think there is nothing more painful than love denied. To love someone you cannot have, to stand beside your heart’s desire and be unable to take them in your arms. A love that cannot be requited. I can think of nothing more painful than that.”

I don’t want to go into too much detail around the plots for each of the tales, because there would be spoilers for The Dark Artifices, but some of the characters we meet again over the decades in Ghosts of the Shadowmarket include: Alex Lightwood and Magnus Bane, Raphael Santiago, Catarina Loss, Lily Chen, Ty Blackthorn; and a couple we knew about but have now got a little bit of back story for, including Matthew Fairchild, Anna Lightwood, and Celine Montclaire.

The other thing I noticed more in this book was the fantastic one-liners and quotes from characters. Perhaps it’s because they were all co-written so the writing is a little different than ‘normal’ in places, or maybe it’s just because Jem is the kind of character to say great things; whatever it was, I ended up adding a bunch of quotes to Goodreads because apparently that’s what I do now.

“A secret too long kept can kill a soul by inches. I watched a secret almost destroy a man once, the finest man ever made. Such a secret is like keeping treasure in a tomb. Little by little, poison eats away at the gold. By the time the door is opened, there may be nothing left but dust.”

As you can probably tell, it did not disappoint, either. Each story had echos of past tales we already know, and they fill in the blanks for a lot of the content we read in the ‘main’ series which can be left unattended for the story to be good, but adds that little bit extra, that something-something, that brings even more life to the entire Shadowhunter universe.

Ghosts of the Showdow Market is not required reading if you’re reading any of the ‘main’ series, but it is definitely fun to get all those additional bits of knowledge and character insight. Like all the books, I would recommend reading this where and when it was released, in regards to reading order: after The Dark Artifices series and even after The Red Scrolls of Magic, which is a smaller book about Magnus Bane and Alec Lightwood. I noticed a story or two from TRSOM come up in GOTSM, so it’s something to be aware of.

Have you read Ghosts of the Shadow Market? What did you think?

On a scale of brilliant-to-amazing, how great is Jem? 

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I received this book from HarperCollins NZ for free in exchange for an honest review. It does not affect my review and all opinions and thoughts are my own.