Skulduggery Pleasant: Resurrection

Image credit: Harper Collins Australia

They say ‘you can’t keep a good man down’, but honestly this saying could be applied to anything. You can’t keep an unrelenting stalker down. You can’t keep a skilled serial killer down. Going back to positivity, in the literary realm it’s, ‘you can’t keep a good character down’ and, when we step back and consider the evidence, we respond with another line: ‘ain’t it the truth?’

Let’s consider Sherlock Holmes, probably the most famous invulnerable character in history. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle became so fed up with being tied to and praised for this one character that he killed him, only to then succumb to the harassment of thousands of outraged fans and resurrect him for more adventures. Stephen King’s hero in Misery, Paul Sheldon, has the same problem –though he only succumbs to one outraged fan with murderous tendencies, the point still stands.

After beating readers to a bloody, breathless pulp with The Dying of the Light, Derek Landy took a break from the Skulduggery Pleasant series, but knew that he couldn’t ‘keep a dead man down’ and came out with the beginning of phase two of the saga: Resurrection.

The book takes place five years after the events of ‘Devastation Day’ –when Darquesse went psycho- and Valkyrie Cain has returned to Ireland after living alone and abroad. Still traumatised and haunted by the events of five years ago, she has hidden away from magic and her life of adventure. But that changes when a new threat appears with plans to destroy the world by sparking a war between mortals and sorcerers. Skulduggery Pleasant convinces Valkyrie to join him for twenty-four hours so that they might stop the resurrection of the Princess of the Darklands and save the world the world. Again.

It’s a fairly apt title, referring to both the physical resurrection of an incredibly deceased sorcerer and the metaphorical resurrection of Valkyrie Cain. It’s still very much a YA novel, however it’s fair to say that the vibe is very different to that of the original series. Seeing as the child-hero has now completely grown up, this is to be expected, as the perspectives have changed and Landy is now trying to convey some pretty serious traumatic feelings. However, the book is made inclusive to its younger audience –and potentially virginal Skulduggery readers- by introducing new characters within a high school setting.

Alongside the story of Valkyrie’s re-entry into the world of magic and Skulduggery’s plans to get his partner back, is the story of Omen Darkly, a young sorcerer with no discernable talent or pizzazz except that he’s the twin brother of the Chosen One. While Omen is not actually a very stimulating or interesting character, he is essential because he’s the guy that people relate to. His is a story of trying to find his own purpose and identity in the world, something that each one of us struggles with every single day, and while he’s not particularly entertaining or charismatic to read about, he’s the character that we all identify with.

Image credit: Skulduggery Pleasant -Wiki Fandom

The rest of the book powers on in much the same way as its predecessors; with secret agendas and over-arching plot lines that will keep Landy writing until he’s fed up and turns Skulduggery Pleasant to dust and has him sucked up by a vacuum cleaner. While some of the narrative twists can get a little predictable, there’s a whole batch of new and interesting characters to keep us entranced including Cadaverous Gant, Temper Fray, and Sebastian Tao.

Resurrection is exciting, engaging, and filled with adventure, violence, action, and suspense. It’s a pretty solid book to re-enter the series with.

Resurrection is the first book in the second phase of Derek Landy’s Skulduggery Pleasant series and was published by HarperCollins Children’s Books in 2017.