Skulduggery Pleasant

Written by Derek Landy

Narrated by Rupert Degas

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 stand in the way of an all-consuming ancient evil.

• Language: English
• Publisher: HarperAudio
• Release date: Apr 10, 2007
• ISBN: 9780061341069

Derek Landy

Derek Landy lives near Dublin. Before writing his children's story about a sharply-dressed skeleton detective, he wrote the screenplays for a zombie movie and a murderous horror film. "I think my career-guidance teacher is spinning in her grave," he says, "or she would be if she were dead."

Reviews for Skulduggery Pleasant

[finxy · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Review from Badelynge Back when I was eleven years old, if you had handed me a book featuring a magic using, skeleton detective, I would have likely snapped your hand off and demanded to know where I could get the next twenty books. As a soon to be 44 year old it takes a little more to impress me. Although there are some gems of children's fiction about these days, this one doesn't come close to competing with the current gold standards of Rowling, Pullman and Stroud. The book, on the whole, is quite easy to read and the action is enthusiastically described like a blow by blow radio commentary for WWF. Derek Landy's world building follows his small group of characters around like a small bubble generated by their presence. There is little depth to it. It just sort of springs up as the characters progress. Skulduggery Pleasant isn't the dynamic and extraordinary figure the cover blurb promises either. He's a rather contradictory fellow who happens to be a skeleton. He doesn't do much detecting either, coming across as more of a gung-ho soldier, though perhaps in future novels he will get a chance to show off his skills rather than his kills. I had trouble sometimes, when there were extended scenes filled with dialogue, in keeping track of who was actually speaking, which considering usually featured a centuries old undead skeleton detective sorcerer conversing with a 12 year old girl hardly seems possible. Stephanie is also too shallow a character, her motivations seem mainly to be driven by avoiding boredom. There are moments when she almost comes alive, notably as she wonders how her parents will deal with the doppelganger living in her bedroom, who will continue to fool the world with a hollow smile after the real Stephanie has died in her quest for adventure but these are way too few. Back when I was eleven none of this would have mattered. My imagination would have filled in all the blanks and coloured all the characters in blazing technicolor. These days my imagination needs a bit more grist for the mill.

[karenduff · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I loved this and couldn't put it down.Skulduggery, or David Tennant playing Doctor Who as that's who he reminds me of, is a brilliant creation. But one of the good things about this book is that a lot of care has gone into the other characters so that they are not just background noise and are a real part of the story. I am really looking forward to reading the rest of this series.

[atreic · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I am not the target audience for this book (which I think is 10-14 year olds who like magic and detective stories and running around shooting things.) But I read quite a lot of kids and young adult books, so I don't think that was the reason it didn't click for me. It's fun - when Stephanie's uncle dies, she discovers a hidden world of magic and evil, and unites with a wisecracking skeleton to defeat the bad guys, along the way finding her own magic powers and taking on a new name. It just never gripped me - they run around a lot, they find mcguffins, they lose mcguffins, etc. And (in a way that is completely fine for a kids book, but isn't very interesting) they just tend to do the obvious thing a lot, in a way that turns out to be quite dim (like 'we know where Gordon has hidden the key! It's really well hidden, the bad guys must have no idea! Let us go and steal it, because then we can go and get the mcguffin! Ah, now the bad guys have us and the key, and now the mcguffin. Oh.') (It has a slightly ikky tone on body image. Stephanie definitely feels described through the male gaze, with her tall, slim, dark haired-ness all coded as 'good', set against her bottle blond, stumpy, badly dressed and bulgy cousins very clearly coded as 'bad'.And Stephanie is snarky, in a way that I ought to like, and that I think is probably very enjoyable if you're twelve, but just rubbed me up a bit the wrong way.)

[krau0098 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is the first book in the Skulduggery Pleasant series and was a fun read, I enjoyed it. It's a blend of fantasy and horror aimed at a middle grade/YA audience. I liked the witty dialogue and the action and humor throughout. It was fun and just a bit silly, while still having an interesting dark fantasy story to it.Stephanie has inherited her uncle Gordon’s estate and also a friend of his named Skulduggery Pleasant. What Stephanie didn’t know is how deep Gordon was involved in a hidden world where sorcery and ancient artifacts are real. Now Stephanie must help find the Scepter of the Ancients to save the world.This book was full of quirky, fun dialogue and lots of action. I would call it dark fantasy rather than horror because there is a lot of magic and things get creepy at points but never really that scary. This ended up being a quick read that had me laughing out loud a number of times. I enjoyed the adventures and action a lot as well. This is an interesting world and I liked Stephanie and Skulduggery as characters.Overall I enjoyed this. I would recommend to middle grade readers who enjoy fantasy with a bit of a dark/horror edge to it. This is easy to read and a lot of fun. I am unsure whether I will continue the series or not at this point. I enjoyed it but I am already reading a lot of other series.

[whybehave2002 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

When I found out this was an Irish author I chose to listen to it because I'm a softy for an accent. There was not much of an accent but I was charmed by the old school detective music at the beginning of each chapter and Rupert Degas has a great voice for bringing Skulduggery to life. Right away I was won over by the dry, sarcastic wit of our Skeleton Detective and his detective in training. This is a great story and a fun beginning to the series.

[ellsie98 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

It took 3 persistent recommendations, half a year and it being unrenewable because it had been renewed the maximum number of times from the library and due back the next day for me to finally read this - and I'm glad I did!

Awesome book, and look forward to reading the rest of them :)

[shaunesay · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I listened to the audiobook and really enjoyed it, it's a lot of fun!

[unevendays · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Very entertaining - I enjoyed this a lot.

[amandabock-1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

My 5th graders are all insane fans of this series. I found it to be quite tedious. It's like reading an action movie. There is no character development, the plot twists and magic are just a bit too convenient, and there was very little suspense. I really had to force myself to finish reading it.

That being said, I don't really have a problem having it in the library. Just please don't make me read any more.

[sageness · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

That was awesome. The body count was a little high for a kids' book but not really that bad compared to TV. Or cartoons. Or Harry Potter. It totally shows that the writer teaches martial arts to kids and has a ton of experience with empowering children to defend themselves physically and verbally. I was filled with YAY!

Wishes: that there'd been more characters of color, that description of characters besides Skulduggery had been more vivid (or extant), that Stephanie's parents had had a little more screentime, and that the whole Bliss arc had been a little better actualized.

But! Hanging threads make for sequels, and so now I will track them down. :D

(The disability tag is for a character grossly disfigured at birth who is beloved and a badass.)

[benuathanasia · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

These took me a while to get into, but it proved worth it. It was entertaining, though Mr. Pleasant wasn't nearly as humorous as the book blurbs professed him to be.

[themadhatters_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I really enjoyed this book. The action is great, and one of the main characters, Skulduggery is a riot. It is a very fast paced book. The whole story was great.

[rata_4 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I felt that this book / series was over rated. Just three chapters in i became bored with the overuse of inane dialogue between Stephanie and Skulduggery, so began to skim read. Also too many characters to remember who is who and on what side in amongst the numerous action encounters that never seemed futile as magic would make various characters such as the cleavers rebuild themselves . Because of this while reading the fighting parts i glimpsed over as well as they seemed repetitive. Hard to stay focused and motivated to read.

[salsabrarian · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Audio review: Fans of Artemis Fowl, Alfred Kropp, Percy Jackson and Harry Potter will enjoy this fantasy of magic, horror and conspiracy. Rupert Degas does the most entertaining voicework I've heard since Jim Dale and Tim Curry, and the spooky, skeleton-bones musical interludes are particularly effective!

Stephanie inherits her beloved Uncle Gordon's estate after his sudden death. His friend, Skulduggery Pleasant (a skeleton) saves her from a violent intruder and with this introduction, Stephanie is thrust into a dark world of magic and terror in which a power-hungry being is intent on obtaining a legendary ancient scepter which apparently had been hidden on the grounds of Uncle Gordon's home. Degas' narration veers from growly to sultry depending on the character, painting a vivid roller coaster ride of an adventure.

[kefeeney-1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Witty, magical, exciting, and mysterious.

[laphenix · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Cute and fun. I like the world and the characters that Landy created.

[rosa.mill · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I finally finished reading this today on my way to work and it was amazing. Skulduggery and Stephanie were great characters and I loved listening to Stephanie find her way in this whole new world. The magic and world building was really interesting. The world is dark but not so dark that everyone ends up dying.

The audiobook narrator did a great job with all of the voices and I loved the music that they would play sporadically, especially the xylophone that sounded like bones.

I especially loved the interview at the end of the disk. Whoever wrote the answers did a great job approximating Sulduggery's personality.

[lislilbet · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Made me laugh out loud in some parts. Loved the different voices and enjoyed listening to the story. Very good

[lemurkat · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This is my second read of this book, and I am still somewhat undecided how I feel about it. Landy writes conversation very well - and there were some ultra-funny laugh out loud moments, but I do feel the plot is somewhat lacking, and it is not something that I can put into words as such. I am not fond of guns in children's books, and they do seem to be a common weapon of choice. But maybe it's the protagonist, Stephanie. I just can't really like her that much. Sure, she's gutsy, rebellious and sharp-tongued, all valuable assets in a heroine. but she's not exactly the sort of person I would like as my daughter. This book is fun, and I am curious to read what follows on - as a series often starts mediocre and builds to better, but it is not one that I shall be rushing out out buy.

[paakre-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Witty dialogue and neat martial arts among the not so living protagonists make this novel fun to read.

[tahleen · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Stephanie Edgley is a normal, if a bit antisocial, 12-year-old. She has normal parents and lives in a normal house in Ireland. Her Uncle Gordon, however, was not so normal; an author of horror novels, he lives in a large, old house and tends to keep strange company. That is, until he dies.

To the surprise of everyone, Stephanie is named Gordon's sole heir to his estate and fortune. It is at this point that things start to get interesting. She meets one of Gordon's strange friends, a Mr. Skulduggery Pleasant, who, as it turns out, is a skeleton (long story)—and she announces that she is going to help him find her uncle's killer, since she's pretty sure he was murdered. What follows is a madcap adventure to, of course, save the world from evil forces.

This was an exceptionally entertaining and darkly funny middle-grade/teen novel. It's the first in a series, and I will most certainly be checking out the rest of the books. This is indeed a very dark book, full of death and tragedies, but Landy keeps it age-appropriate and keeps gore to a minimum, though some not-so-likable characters meet deliciously gruesome demises.

Landy has created a world where magical beings coexist with non-magical humans, with the latter more often than not being none the wiser. It's similar in that sense to Harry Potter, but there the similarities end. Magical folk live in a dangerous world, where a war between those who seek power and those protecting the general population has been waged for decades (probably longer, I can't remember exactly, but a really long time). At the time we join the characters in their story, both sides have agreed to a tenuous ceasefire, which of course blows up in everyone's faces, otherwise there would be no story.

As for characters, these are all brilliant. Skulduggery is stoic but with an incredibly wry humor, and Stephanie has some excellent zingers too, along with her determination, stubbornness, and incredible courage. They are, to put it simply, awesome. Oh, and they are both great fighters, which we get to see a lot of.

I listened to the audio version of this book narrated by Rupert Degas, and it was fantastic. Degas was excellent at distinguishing voices, and paced his narration perfectly. Plus he has an accent.

Long story short, if you like dark, humorous, action-packed fantasy, this is a great series to start.

[lindap69 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

When Stephanie learns that her uncle's death may have been murder she joins with the skeleton detective Skulduggery Pleasant to foil the plot of the Faceless Ones. Not great literature but a fast read and lots of action.

[akmargie · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Love, love, love this book. It had action, adventure, magic, snappily dressed skelton detective and more dry wit than you know what to do with. Great female characters and a fun story. I hope my first novel is as amazing!

[jaguar897 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This book is another free gem I got off the YA Sync Summer Audio Program. I really love this program because I end up listening to stuff that I otherwise wouldn’t have picked up on my own. The cover of the book looked hokey and the description didn’t do much for me, but I was pleasantly surprised when I started listening that it was actually a fun, intelligent read.

The story is of Skulduggery Pleasant who is a walking, talking magic wielding skeleton. Skulduggery is as cool and awesome as his name implies. He’s a witty, snarky, badass crime-solving bastard. What’s even more awesome is that his partner, Stephanie, is just as cool and witty. Stephanie is a 12 year old girl, who basically inherited her uncle’s problems upon his death. I must say she sounds older than 12, but I didn’t mind because I really liked the chemistry and dialogue between these two.

I also enjoyed the secondary characters. Tanith Low was cool and very badass. For some reason she reminds me of Tonks from Harry Potter. I also enjoyed Ghastly and Mrs. Bliss. From this first book it seems like these characters have stories of their own and I’m very interested in finding out more about them.

The audiobook for this story was excellent. I loved the musical accompaniment, especially for Skulduggery’s scenes. It really suited the character. My only real compliant about the narration is that it seemed like Skulduggery’s “voice” would change. It was annoying, because I was never sure if he was the one talking until I listened to more of the audio and then I would have to re-listen to those parts. Also, I’m not sure if this is due to the audiobook or writing, but I found the action scenes hard to follow. Another GR, friend read this book though and thought the same thing, so I believe it has more to do with the writing than the audio.

Overall though, this book was really enjoyable. Very witty, funny and nice fast paced action.

[scote23 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This book kept me entertained. A chuckler. Good for kids who want a fantasy novel with a touch of horror, with British language.

[codename5012 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This book was SO MUCH FUN.

[laneliterati · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I really dug Skulduggery, and my only complaint would be for some more humor from the book's two main characters (which would then lead me to give this book 5 stars). They have a really great dynamic, and the humor definitely helps the book along when times get serious for the heroes. Would highly recommend to any teen readers who are into magic, sci-fi, fantasy novels and like some light along with their dark.

[mamzel_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Fans of Rick Riordan and J.K. Rowling's books will have fun with this one. 12-year old Stephanie Edgley is left her uncle's home and fortune built from writing horror books. A very strange person, Skulduggery Pleasant, is also invited to the reading of the will and is left an unusual message. Things get exciting when Stephanie is left to spend the night in her uncle's house and someone breaks in and demands a key. Skulduggery arrives to save her and so their adventures begin.Derek Landy is a black belt in Kenpo Karate and includes a lot of fight scenes which also include swords, scepters, scythes, and magic. Lots of magic. Stephanie has found a life full of adventure and discovers that she may have a little magic herself.A quick read for adults, this would please young readers and keep them turning pages (if they can get through the first 100 pages of character introductions).

[range7 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I love reading fantasy, but was tired of vampires. So I was I was "pleasant"ly surprised when I picked up this title that features a walking-talking skelton detective that combines fantasy with mystery and adventure. Based in Ireland, the story leads us into the unknown world of sorcerers, elementals, magic, and a few vampires thrown in for good measure. The details about the three names is unique and fascinating and may lead the reader to selecting their own magical name. The story is fast-paced and easy to read. I would suggest the title for more mature young adult readers. There is no bad language or sex, but plenty of violence and torture. The series was published first in Europe and has been making its way to the U.S.A (rather slowly to an expectant reader). The Ancient ones (similar to the works of Lovecraft) are something to be left alone and there are always those that want to bring them back and those guardians that make sure they do not. I first became acquainted with the works of Lovecraft through the Real Ghostbusters cartoons. A similar group of bad guys also appears in the Percy Jackson series. “The only currency worth anything is being true to yourself, and the only goal worth seeking is finding out who you truly are.” – Uncle Gordon’s Will – Advice to Stephanie (p22).

[eurekas_5 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Some books are sustaining, books like all of the Harry Potter books, The Lord of the Rings, and Jane Eyre. These books I can go back to again and again; they’re like going home. Skulduggery Pleasant is a lark, it’s fun, it’s witty; I read it in a day, thoroughly enjoyed it but would never read it again. I will look forward to reading the next books in the series though!