November 19

‘Skulduggery Pleasant’ by Derek Landy

Skulduggery          Meet Skulduggery Pleasant, ace detective and walking, talking, fire-throwing skeleton and Valkyrie Cain, strong-willed, intelligent, 12-year-old girl. This novel is set Valkyrie Cain’s hometown of Ireland. This book has three dominant characters displayed throughout. These characters include Skulduggery Pleasant, Valkyrie Cain and Nefarian Serpine. There are also characters such as Tanith Low and China Sorrows. However, both of these characters are not as important.
Skulduggery Pleasant is a walking, talking skeleton who fought against Malevolent under Grand Mage Meritorius during the secret war as one of the leaders of a group called ‘The Dead Men’, but was caught in a deadly trap by Nefarian Serpine. This trap killed Skulduggery’s wife and child in front of him.
Skulduggery’s partner, Valkyrie Cain (also known as Stephanie Edgley), is a 12-year-old girl from a seaside town in Ireland named Haggard. Stephanie accompanies Skulduggery on his adventures. On the way, she starts to develop magic skills. She goes from manipulating air in a climatic battle scene to creating fire by the end of the novel. Valkyrie gets her first name from the Norse warrior women who guard Valhalla, and her last name from the word ‘cain’.
Nefarian Serpine is an evil sorcerer who once served under Malevolent as one of his infamous ‘Three Generals’. In the novel, Nefarian accidentally destroys the ‘Book of Names’ with the ancient sceptre. This prevents the return of the Faceless Ones. Enraged by his mistake, he tries to kill Stephanie but Skulduggery stops him and avenges the death of his loved ones by turning him to dust with the sceptre.
The plot in this novel is quite detailed, however, it starts off with Nefarian Serpine trying to retrieve the Ancient Sceptre from Gordon Edgley’s mansion. However, this does not work out as planned. As Skulduggery and Valkyrie are trying to stop Nefarian, a tailor, librarian and a professional swordswoman help them. These people are known as Ghastly Bespoke, China Sorrows and Tanith Low. In the end, the Book of Names is destroyed; Serpine is killed breaking the Sceptre’s power in the process.
I liked this book for many reasons, however, I especially liked it because of the fantasy. Fantasy books are very interesting, as you never know what is going to happen because it is not realistic. I would recommend this book to teenagers. The ages would mainly be 12-16.
Jack, Year 9

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   Skulduggery Pleasant! Have you ever met a dead man? Well Stephanie Edgley has. Skulduggery is a pranking detective that goes out of his way to cause mischief in all situations. He is a brave magician, master of tricks and is always getting himself into trouble. His 12 year old side kick, Stephanie is tired of her regular life. After a man breaks into her house and tries to kill her, she is saved by the skeleton man; Skulduggery. Do you like books with intense action and dramatic adventure? Well then this is a great book for you!

‘Skullduggery Pleasant’ is set in a small seaside town in Ireland called Haggard. This town is where Stephanie and her family live their normal everyday lives. It doesn’t take much, however, for it to change into a wondrous place, achieved by the hands of Skulduggery. If you haven’t figured it out, Skulduggery is a walking, talking skeleton that is a master magician of the elements. This ‘prime detective’, as they call him, is over 400 years old and is one of the wisest men on Earth. His wisely chosen side kick, Stephanie, is a courageous, strong willed 12 year old girl that is just looking for an exciting adventure.

Both Skulduggery and Stephanie are trying to solve the mystery of her uncle’s death which involves many of the evil magicians and wizards. They have to journey far and wide to figure out how it happened and who was responsible. They encounter the baddest of bad and have to fight for their lives in multiple situations. This daring duo are just asking for disaster. At the same time as solving the mystery, they are looking for a mythical yet powerful item called the ‘Septer of the Ancients’ that could cause horrific damage to the entire world.

I personally enjoyed this book because of its magnificent storyline. It has a twisted plot that surprises you on every page. The adventure and mystery that they go on trying to solve the murder intrigued me and made me want to keep reading on. This is a great book for young readers and anyone from the ages of 9 – 15 will definitely love this read.

‘Skulduggery Pleasant’ 4 out of 5 stars. Liam M, Year 9

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Posted November 19, 2014 by marjk in category Adventure stories, Student Reviews

About the Author

Teacher-librarian at Aquinas College, Southport, Gold Coast, Australia

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