Let's Talk About Jace and The Carstairs Family

Jace and Clary by comfortablylaura

This could be my favorite post of Cassie's (link to her tumblr) because it includes two of my favorite characters, Jace and Jem (okay, the Carstairs family, but you guys know how Anything Jem is immediately important to me):

Hi Cassie I love your books and am a huge fan but I was just wondering… Jace reveals (not that he’s had sex) that he’s been intimate before with a girl(s). I was just wondering if you had anyone in mind whom he’d been intimate with and why that didn’t even bother Clary? Would be so grateful if you answered my question Thank you — rottinpeace
Cassie: I have various thoughts about Jace’s love life before Clary (we know he dated the faerie waitress, Kaelie, before Clary, because they actually snuggle and cuddle in front of Clary — I think people forget that!) but nothing so concrete I want to put to paper/Internet yet. I assume Clary doesn’t care because why would she? It’s got nothing to do with her. He dated before her, in TDA Emma’s had boyfriends and sex before the book starts, in TID neither Will or Jem has had any sex before Tessa — people vary. I’m sure he’d tell her about it if she asked, but I suspect readers want to know the gory details more than she does. :)

Hi Cassie, I read CoHF and The Infernal Devices too and I thought that Jem Carstairs was the last Carstairs alive, so how does Emma have the same last name? I read this and got a little confused, because Jem becomes an silent brother, resulting in the ending of that last name. Please help me. (if my English is a little poor I’m so sorry, because I’m Brazilian) Kisses! — aninkheart
Cassie: And I’m leaving for Brazil tomorrow! Meanwhile, this is how the Carstairs name continues.

He was stocky, perhaps in his late thirties, with a scar that ran along his jaw. Tousled, fairish hair, and blue eyes, and skin tanned by the sun. It looked even darker against his starched white shirtfront. There was something familiar about him, something that teased at the edges of Tessa’s memories.

He came to a stop in front of them. His eyes flicked to Will. They were a paler blue than Will’s, almost the color of cornflowers. The skin around them was tanned and lined with faint crow’s-feet. He said, “You are William Herondale?” Will nodded without speaking.
,br/> “I am Elias Carstairs,” the man said. “Jem Carstairs was my nephew.”
— Clockwork Princess

The Carstairs line continues through Elias Carstairs. There are also other Carstairs. Jem never says he is the last of his line or the last Carstairs out there. Shadowhunter families can sometimes be huge — Cristina, Diego and Jaime are all Rosaleses, but Cristina is in fact related to neither of them except perhaps incredibly distantly.

I don't know about you, Mundie Moms, but the line of questions about Jace's love life before he met Clary always cracks me up. I think we care because he's such a charismatic character and we've literally been through hell (and back) with him. As for what he was like before he met Clary, I think he'd still be the snarky, over-confident dude we first meet in CoB. And that makes it all the more interesting as his relationship with Clary develops because, for the first time, his feelings for a girl are overwhelming him.