The Faceless Ones

Book Title: The Faceless Ones

Author: Derek Landy

Series: Skulduggery Pleasant #3

Date Started: December 26th 2017

Date Completed: December 28th 2017

Genres: Fantasy, Action, Adventure, Horror, Young Adult, Childrens
Quality Rating: Four Stars
Enjoyment Rating: Five Star

Final Rating: Five stars

Review:

Rereading this series is like discovering them all over again, regardless of the fact I've skim-read and reread my favourite parts more times than I can count. The Faceless Ones was never my favourite, and that holds, but reading the story in full again makes me appreciate the hints for the future and the character arcs so much. This was really the book that kicked the Skulduggery Pleasant series into action and for that it's special.

What gets me about these now that I'm older is how well executed they are for younger audiences. I remember reading something where Derek was defending his use of violence in these books - and yes, there is a lot of violence - and saying that the whole point is that it's serious. There is murder, and there are violent people, and there are heroes getting seriously hurt. Because it's a world in which those things happen, and Derek takes that seriously. Which means that Valkyrie, even when she's 14, is involved. But it's not taken lightly; she does get hurt, and people acknowledge that she's too young to be in the middle of that.

In general, Derek is aware of the problematic elements of being a hero but he doesn't shy away from it, even if his hero is a pre-teen. Instead of dismissing her and her abilities, the characters TALK to Valkyrie about it; they make sure she understands the real danger she's in, and they ASK her how she feels. And respect her answers. She's a 14-year-old in an adult's dangerous world, but that doesn't mean she should be patronised or restricted, it means that she should learn and be protected until she can defend herself. My favourite line of this book is Kenspeckle telling her 'you seem to have this ridiculous notion that being treated like a child means to be treated with any less respect than an adult'. These books are mature without being cruel, accessible without being patronising, and empowering without being manipulative.

Which leads me on to our protagonist. When I was younger, I basically remembered my age as being a year younger than Valkyrie - that's how much of a role model she was to me (despite the fact we aren't really that similar - I'm far more a Tanith). And rightly so. Val is a great protagonist not because she's a hero, but because she so regularly makes mistakes and learns from them. It's 'how to write a children's protagonist 101', but Derek approaches it with a very adult perspective; this isn't a one-off per book, this is creating a solid human being. She's a reckless smart-mouth who can be rude at the best of times, but she's clever and kind too.

To be honest, I could sit down over three or four days and read this entire series cover-to-cover without stopping. I never want to put them down and I feel so at home with them that I wouldn't really need anything else. It's become somewhat of a tradition to say this in every review of this series, but Skulduggery was the equivalent of Harry Potter in my childhood, and I think they're some of the best children's books that can be read by anyone out there.