Skulduggery Pleasant: Mortal Coil

By Derek Landy

Skulduggery Pleasant and Valkyrie Cain are back--just in time to see their whole world turn upside down! While they struggle to protect a known killer from an unstoppable assassin, Valkyrie is on a secret mission of her own. This quest, to prevent her dark and murderous destiny, threatens to take her to the brink of death and beyond. And then the body-snatching Remnants get loose, thousands of twisted souls who possess the living like puppets, and they begin their search for a being powerful enough to lead them. Facing such insurmountable odds, Skulduggery, Valkyrie, Ghastly, and Tanith can trust no one. Not even each other.


Skulduggery Pleasant is by far the darkest book series I’ve ever read. I usually stay clear of horror in all shapes and forms because it tends to get gory and makes me feel nasty inside. Derek Landy though, I just keep coming back to Skulduggery because I love the characters, and the humor. Oh the humor. It’s by far the best part of the series! I laugh out loud at the witty clever and ridiculous things that they say. It’s such a juxtaposed theme: you’ve got horror (legitimate horror mind you) and then you’ve got laugh-so-hard-I cried parts.

This, the 5^th book in the series, was quite a bit darker than I expected, at parts I had to put the book down to just look up and see that the sun was indeed still shining outside. Between Valkyrie trying to figure out how to escape the future that has been foretold for her, figuring out how to capture and stop the Remnants, and just trying to not die this book is action packed to the extreme. The hard thing about reviewing this series is that you don’t want to spoil anything, and the plot is so intertwined it’s almost impossible to talk about it without giving something away! I will say this though: if you like humor and horror, keep on reading Skulduggery. Holy cow is this a great read. Plot. Writing. Characters. Everything is just top notch.

I give it a 4 out of 5

Skulduggery Pleasant 3: The Faceless Ones

By Derek Landy

If you’ve read the previous Skulduggery books then you know what the Faceless Ones are—and if you know what the Faceless Ones are, then you can probably take a wild guess that things in this book are going to get AWFULLY sticky for out skeletal hero and his young sidekick.
If you haven’t read the previous Skulduggery books then what are you doing reading this? Go and read them right now, so that you know what all that stuff in the previous paragraph was about.
Done? Good. So now you’re on tenterhooks too, desperately awaiting the answers to all your questions, and instead you’re going to have to wait to read the book. Sorry about that.

I’ve loved Skulduggery Pleasant since I discovered them a few years ago, and it’s been hard to find copies of the series where I live, so I waited to read this book until I knew I could get the next books. This book had a definite tone dip toward the dark. I was a little discomfited at the major swing toward depressingness that this one made, but thankfully Landy does even it out successfully with his trademark humor. This book isn’t a stand-alone like the other two have been and begins a story arc that you can see going to the dark side of things. It had the same sort of vibe that the show “Supernatural”. In this book Valkyrie and Skulduggery are in the middle of a huge mess. The Faceless ones, gods from another world, are returning to our world. Skulduggery, being Skulduggery, is the only one that sees both sides and tries to stop what is about to happen: the end of the world. It was a great read, and we meet some new people and reunite with some old ones. This book, however, has enough of a cliffhanger that I wouldn’t suggest reading it without having the next book handy. I was dying to know what happened, and I’ll leave it at that. A-maz-ing.

I give it a solid 4 out of 5

Skulduggery Pleasant 4: Dark Days

By Derek Landy

Skulduggery Pleasant is lost on the other side of the portal, with only some evil gods for company. Can he possibly survive? (Yes, all right, he’s already dead. But still.).

I listened to the audiobook of this and I wish I would’ve started out listening to the audiobooks. That narrator, Rupert Degas, is the man. He does all the voices so perfectly, especially Skulduggery. And this one was just…goodness…it was amazing. I loved it so much and Skulduggery is just one of my favorite characters ever. I can’t say much without spoiling the wonderful surprises in this book. Which is probably why I couldn’t find a decent synopsis either (though the one above made me smile as per usual with Landy). Again, this series is taking a definite turn for the darker side of things, but I can’t stop reading it. I love Skulduggery too much to give up, though the next few books will tell whether I finish or not. But this was amazing! Read it!

I give it a 4.25 out of 5

Skullduggery Pleasant: Playing With Fire

By Derek Landy

 Skulduggery and Valkyrie are facing a new enemy: Baron Vengeous, who is determined to bring back the terrifying Faceless Ones and is crafting an army of evil to help him. Added to that, Vengeous is about to enlist a new ally (if he can raise it from the dead), the horrible Grotesquery, a very unlikeable monster of legend.  Once Vengeous is on the loose, dead bodies and vampires start showing up all over Ireland. Now pretty much everybody is out to kill Valkyrie, and the daring detective duo faces its biggest challenge yet.

 But what if the greatest threat to Valkyrie is just a little closer to home?

 

 

And one of my new favorites does it again. Now, generally speaking, this story plot is much the same as the first book, but differs in execution and sheer hilarity as Skullduggery and Valkyrie try to defeat Baron Vengeous and prevent the rise of the Faceless Ones while battling one grotesque...Grotesquery.  And also, THAT my friend is a vampire.  Let the puns fly and the sarcasm drip as you are launched into yet another adventure/mystery of Skullduggery Pleasant. I just smile thinking about this series.

 

I give it a 4 out of 5 because I'm in love!

 

 

Favorite Quote: (Well, one of them)

“He looked at her. 'In order to finish, I'll have to have defeated six Infected, Dusk, and Vengeous himself.'

Yeah. So?'

The Infected I can manage.'

She frowned. 'And Vengeous? I mean, you can beat him, right?'

Well,' he said, "I can certainly try. And trying is half the battle.'

What's the other half?'

He shrugged. 'Hitting him more times than he hits me.” 

Skulduggery Pleasant

By Derek Landy

 Meet Skulduggery Pleasant:

Ace Detective
Snappy Dresser
Razor-tongued Wit
Crackerjack Sorcerer
And
Walking, Talking,
Fire-throwing Skeleton.

 As well as ally, protector, and mentor of Stephanie Edgely, a very unusual and darkly talented twelve-year-old.

These two alone must defeat an all-consuming ancient evil.

The end of the world?

 Over his dead body.

 

 

Fantastic! This book is my find of the month, or probably the last few months, if not the year. I absolutely and irrefutably love love love this book.  Irish author Derek Landy has the best sense of humor I have seen in writing; very akin to Rick Riordan with dry wit and wonderful back and forth bickering between Skulduggery and Stephanie. What's not to love with a skeleton detective that does magic and makes quips?  I can't recommend this book highly enough. The themes are dark magic and horror, but the way Landy handles it is appropriate and fun. It doesn't diminish the terribleness of things, but it doesn't drag your soul through the proverbial mud either when he writes about torture and death. Strange how much I enjoyed reading about Skulduggery, who is immediately likeable but dangerous underneath it all. Stephanie isn't as interesting for me, but I enjoy all the characters we're introduced to, especially Tanith Low and China Sorrows. Another Brilliant part for me is about how everyone is born with thier True name, and then have their Given name, and if they want, they can use thier Taken name as a protection against spells. I admit I spent a great deal of time coming up with a Taken name for myself just for fun that fit me. It was that much fun. And when you read this, because I am willing you with my mind powers, you should go check out the official web site (www.skulduggerypleasant.com/us) and listen to the interview with Skulduggery. It was freaking awesome. Oh how I love these books, and hope to have them on my shelves soon. And I just found out there are like 6 of them! I don't think we have all of them in the States yet, but I'll wait less than patiently for their arrival.  This is a great series for young boys in my opinion, as there aren't many that boys react well to. Like Rick Riordan? You'll love Derek Landy. READ SKULDUGGERY PLEASANT!!!!

 

4 1/4 out of 5- Because it was above average, and I loved it so much I want to own it. That doesn't happen often.

 

This is just for fun: