Skulduggery Pleasant
Skulduggery Pleasant
By: Derek Landy
When Gordon Edgley suddenly dies, his niece Stephanie inherits more than she has bargained for. She also wonders about the mysterious man who appears at the reading of the will: his entire face is covered with a scarf and sunglasses. This man, Skulduggery Pleasant, receives an unusual parting gift from Gordon; advice. It doesn't make much sense to Stephanie, but then neither does her final gift from her beloved uncle: the majority of what he owns.
Stephanie and her mother go to Gordon's house to look at the house that will be hers when she turns eighteen and have car troubles. Stephanie decides to stay behind while her mother goes with the tow truck driver back into town. At first, Stephanie is fine being alone in Gordon's huge house, but when a disturbing phone call and a sinister visitor show up, Stephanie is in for more than she bargained for. Cue Skulduggery Pleasant.
Skulduggery is a detective, a smart-aleck (just like Stephanie), sorcerer and just happens to be a skeleton who walks, talks, and can use the elements of earth to his advantage, like throwing fire. He's a character with an attitude the reader will appreciate.
So what's the point of the story? Gordon had found a fabled scepter with massive powers and now Serpine (token bad guy) is after it and wants to bring back the Faceless Ones. Of course, this process will bring war to the Elders who don't completely believe Skulduggery and Stephanie when they warn them of the danger they're all in. They enlist help from Skulduggery's "friends," of which there is a lot more to them than what appears, to help solve the mystery. Betrayal and loyalty are a major point in this book: if you do nothing does that make you bad? If you do something that's ‘right' and it ends badly is that good? China Sorrows in particular is a character to examine closely. I expect to see more of her in future installments of this series: she's a complicated one and not clear-cut like so many characters in young adult literature are.
Chaos, magic, and a lot of smart-aleck comments abound in this book. It's a great adventure story with an intriguing main character in Skulduggery. For a skeleton, he's quite the complicated guy.
Recommended To:
- Boys - I know, Stephanie is a pretty major character, but the guys are going to love the whole walking, talking, fire-throwing skeleton thing.
- Fantasy lovers
- Those intrigued by the power of names
- Everyone!
Notes on the Cover:
I really love that it shows Skulduggery and his use of the elements: earth, air, fire and water (earth is a last resort, by the way). You see the scarf of his snappy suit blowing in the breeze, the spray of the water just coming at his front, and the ball of fire he's ready to throw in his hands. (I love that in the story there's a price for the amount of magic that you use.) The title of the book is in raised, green letters which really stand out at the top of the page. When you get to the bottom I love the tag: And He's the Good Guy. Without that you'd maybe think he was the villain of the story and be expecting a completely different book.