Playing with Fire

Book Title: Playing with Fire

Author: Derek Landy
Series: Skulduggery Pleasant #2

Date Started: December 29th 2016

Date Completed: December 31st 2016

Genres: Fantasy, Adventure, Mystery, Thriller, Action
Quality Rating: Four Stars
Enjoyment Rating: Five Star

Final Rating: Five stars

Review:

I wasn't feeling up for starting a whole new book in the few days before the end of the year, so instead I snuck in a reread of another Skulduggery book. Playing with Fire was my absolute favourite book when I was younger - probably until Death Bringer came out - and like with the first book, I was a bit apprehensive as to whether to would stand up to what I remembered it as. And, again, I needn't have worried. It's funny looking back so early in the series though, because as much as I love it, the game hasn't even begun yet. Playing with Fire is pretty much the definition of 'the good old days'.

I'm starting to understand why - past the sheer awesomeness - I love these books so much. The brilliant female characters and politics definitely have something to do with it, not to mention the action scenes and magic system. But for me personally, what I noticed while rereading Playing with Fire was how these stories run like a film. There's this perfect, succinct imagery that presents what's happening so exactly in your head that you can anticipate and feel the tone with just a few words. And Derek does it without having to fuel it all with cliches - I'm reading these events run off like the most smoothly edited and staged scene in a film and it's utterly brilliant. Derek has a history in screenwriting, and it definitely comes through. But for me as a film student hoping to be a director, how could I not love a something that gives me a crystal clear film in my head?

Oh, this series. Oh the action, oh the plot, oh the one-liners, oh the characters, oh everything. Oh, Derek. Stop it. This guy can spin off a story about a teenage girl and a skeleton detective solving crimes and make it about so much more. He can have a rich magical world and let us focus on the excitement and wonder of it, but have a complex political power play going on in the background. He can give you characters that are diverse and varied, and ones that are utterly evil, but you love them because they feel so real. He can make each book its own story, enjoyable in its own right, and weave it into a much bigger arc without losing the integrity of each individual novel. If we're talking specifically about Playing with Fire he can write several little crime stories in one, a few dozen awesome action scenes, countless points of character development, and make it into a story about saving the world that you haven't seen before. Yes, I am completely biased in everything I say about this series, but I'm biased because it's persuaded me to love it so much.

You can tell Derek's a schemer when you go back and read the early books. There are little hints to what happens later in the story scattered literally everywhere, and it's a shame it's not really something you can appreciate on your first read when you have no idea where things lead. But catching the foreshadowing and ironic little turns (intentional or not) makes rereading it so much more engaging, even when you know what's happening like the back of your hand. I don't often reread books in general - oo many books, so little time and all - but I don't even hesitate with Derek, because I know I'll have just as much fun as the first time, and probably find new stuff that I never noticed before while I'm at it.

Seeing all the characters at this early point in the story makes me respect them even more. The development from now to the end of the series is staggering, but we still start with solid characters at the beginning. Something I've been thinking about with this series is the way in which it portrays different kinds of intelligence and how that really isn't something you see that much. You tend to get stories that have the 'book smart' person but that ends up being pretty much the only form of intelligence around. In Skulduggery, there are definitely people who are book smart, but Bliss has strategic intelligence, Tanith is people smart, Valkyrie learns on her feet so fast, and Skulduggery... let's not fuel his ego.

Valkyrie, especially, is such a brilliant character, and for more than seeing a female protagonist with intelligence and physical strength. While I hesitate to call this a children's series (especially towards the end), I did read these books when I was a lot younger, and while rereading Playing with Fire it struck me who grateful I am for a character like Val. Because Valkyrie is uncertain and scared in this book. She's the protagonist, she's brave at times, and she's kick ass and awesome. But she's a thirteen year old kid who doesn't know entirely what she's doing; she hasn't mastered her magic yet and she's being put into a lot of really dangerous situations in which she's always surrounded by adults. She gets hurt, and she gets scared in a realistic way that you would in those situations. But she carries on anyway and deals with the fallout as she goes. I respect Derek so much for taking his time to build her up as a person over this huge series because it's so valuable for such a young protagonist to honestly be scared and inexperienced in a story, but improve as they grow up. Like myself, a lot of kids have and do read this series, and I don't think I've seen a character grow and develop and become stronger just through growing up like I have with Valkyrie, and that's such a great thing to show younger people.

While I can't say it's my favourite book in the series anymore, rereading Playing with Fire properly (I'm skim read all of the books about twenty times each) was almost a different experience to when it first came out. It really reminds you how far everyone has come and how dark things really get. But, at the same time, this book isn't trivial. Yeah, it's not the gritty, edgy finale that we end up at, but it's still complex and clever and awesome. This series has something in it for everyone, and even now I'm finding new aspects I hadn't noticed before. Reading Skulduggery Pleasant feels like coming home.