Resurrection

Skulduggery Pleasant #10

by Derek Landy

The skeleton detective is coming back to life...again! It's the tenth, triumphant novel in the Skulduggery Pleasant series, and it will rearrange your world.

Skulduggery and Valkyrie are back in the tenth instalment in the best-selling Skulduggery Pleasant series - an incredible and unexpected treat for the legions of fans around the world.

We can't say much but we can say this: Skulduggery and Valkyrie are going to team up with beloved characters from the first nine audiobooks as well as an all-new cast, including new teen co-star Omen Darkly, for an adventure that takes the story to truly global proportions...while answering questions that go right back to the beginning.

And Derek says this: 'I was halfway through Last Stand of Dead Men, I think, when I realised that I had more stories to tell. I told myself that if Skulduggery and Valkyrie survived the series, I would leave the option open of returning to their world. There were still secrets I need to reveal, after all, and there were still horrors they had to face. They survived the first series. But they're really going to wish they hadn't.'

©2017 Derek Landy (P)2017 HarperCollins Publishers

Genres: Fantasy, Young Adult, Urban Fantasy, Fiction, Magic, Mystery, Audiobook

424 pages, Kindle Edition

First published June 1, 2017

About the author

Derek Landy is an Irish writer and screenwriter. In addition to the bestselling children's/YA series of Skulduggery Pleasant books, a supernatural mystery series starring Skulduggery Pleasant, a skeleton detective, and Valkyrie Cain, a young female magician, he has written two screenplays that have been made into films: the IFTA award winning "Dead Bodies" and the IFTA nominated "Boy Eats Girl". Landy himself was nominated for an IFTA for Best Script.

He doesn’t like to brag about all the awards he’s won, such as the Irish Book of the Decade, or the Red House in the UK, or all the other awards that he humbly displays on his mantelpiece. He is also far too modest to mention things like the first book being a Publisher’s Weekly Best Book of the Year, but would like to extend an invitation to Oprah to pop around one day for tea, in thanks for selecting his book for the Oprah’s Book Club Kids Reading List.

Derek plays too many video games, reads too many comics, and watches too many movies. He lives in Ireland with too many cats. Occasionally he talks to real people, but only when he absolutely has to.

Reviews

[Niki · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book let me down.

Mom voice: I'm not mad, I'm just disappointed. (spoiler: I am very mad, and also disappointed)

I can't say I was looking forward to this book very much. I knew Derek Landy would probably fuck it up, because he did exactly what JK Rowling did: they both wrote a successful series (although SP isn't as popular as HP, still), they tried to "move on" (The Casual Vacancy, the Demon Road series), their new books weren't nearly as successful, so they went right back to their successful series (the Cursed Child play and Fantastic Beasts movie series, and now Resurrection) And they both fucked it all up.

A note: I have seen some other disappointed people say that they maybe outgrew the series; I can say with certainty that I haven't, because I read it just last year, I hadn't been reading the books ever since I was a preteen (like I could have) So I'm absolutely certain that the "original" series (for lack of better name for it) is perfectly suited for adults.

This book, however, isn't.

I'm about 95% certain that Derek Landy never meant to continue the series. My proof: in Resurrection, he tries to shoehorn in all sorts of stuff we should have known about before, things that he should have and WOULD HAVE mentioned had he been planning this, just like he meticulously planned the original series. The Arbiters? Abyssinia?? Are you freaking kidding me that Vile got a girlfriend who was a huge deal, while he was consumed by grief and anger?? This is fucking ridiculous, and that's just two examples out of many.

Also, some major characters died OFFSCREEN, between books. Maybe that will be elaborated on later, but the book should be fine as a standalone, like the original series was, not a "Keep reading to find out!!!" cash grab like many other series are. That's one of the things I liked the most in the original series.

Maybe Derek just needs some time to get back into his SP writing, because he also tried a new gimmick, having the end of a chapter correspond with the beginning of the next, like:

Character: "Oh man, my wife is the prettiest woman in the world" (end chapter)
(Chapter beginning) Beautiful woman character, talking on the phone: "Did you call me 10 minutes ago?"

Which irked me to no end. It was fine for the first few times, but not when it happened for 15 consecutive chapters.

The book was confusing. I'm a hardcore SP fan, and it hasn't been that long since I read the entire series, and yet there were names I had to look up to remember which "was-mentioned-once" character was. There were so many new characters, and Derek really didn't handle them well. There were a bunch of villains, a bunch of characters from the magic school, that Sebastian guy and the Hollow Man romance subplot I didn't care about, and more!

Not to mention the MANY new shoehorned in plot points, like Valkyrie being a psychic, or the possibility of Darquesse coming back (which is the lamest thing that Derek could do), or Neoterics, or Abyssinia's upcoming reign of terror, or even a character that can resurrect people, no matter how long ago they died- if Ghastly comes back (he's the one that the fans miss the most), his death will become a completely cheap moment instead of the shock it is. GOD I hope he doesn't come back, even though I loved him to bits.

I've seen people complain that Skulduggery was "out of character" since he was under Smoke's command for a big part of the book. Let me tell you why that bit was bullshit.

First of all, Smoke's ability was very hyped as something inescapable, with devastating consequences.... but then we find out it fades after a very short time, and when people get touched by Smoke, they just spout "I want to kill [x person]" randomly, alongside their normal dialogue. Skulduggery was just a bit meaner than his usual self, but he still seemed very much himself to me- he didn't even kill Valkyrie when he could, only talked about doing it (and never did it ofc). Were we supposed to be scared that he would stay "bad" for long? Because it was pretty obvious he'd be fine by the end of the book, so the whole "possession!" thing was cheap and had no emotional impact.

Also, Smoke's ability was basically the same thing as the Remnant's we've already seen: the person becomes an "evil version" of themselves. Nothing new here. At first I thought the characters would go berserk, but nope.

And thirdly, Skulduggery just breaking Smoke's influence like nothing at the most "suspence!!" moment, was the worst moment of the entire book. Was it supposed to be heartwarming? Or even awesome? Because it only got an eyeroll from me.

Would you believe that I have even MORE to complain about, even after this huge wall of text? Because I do, and it was the shipping. There were so many deliberate Valkyrie/ Skulduggery moments in the book, it was fucking ridiculous. I've heard that Derek is currently dating a Valduggery shipper, so these moments are even worse in retrospect, since they're probably a form of fanservice. Personally, I am very not into these two being an item instead of platonic partners, since Valkyrie is literally an infant compared to Skulduggery, the power balance in their relationship would be nowhere near equal.

So, after all this complaining, let's take a look at the parts I liked in the book: I liked Omen, and I liked how Valkyrie's PTSD was handled. I didn't mind the absence of jokes in the book and I didn't find it "depressing". I had many problems with the book, but the absence of humor wasn't one.

Yeah. The book was overly long and not particularly well written, the shipping was unnecessary (if you're a Valduggery shipper, please consider: not everyone is and not everyone liked that the "big moment" was shiptastic), and I honestly couldn't care less about the new villain, or the possibility of Darquesse coming back. Having to face her another time will be completely ridiculous.


P.S. I also hated the obvious Trump clone/ stand-in, Flannery. You cannot swing a dead cat without hitting a Trump ~parody!!!!~ after the election, there are Trump references EVERYWHERE you look at. I get that creators want to make their voice heard, but: A) people tend to read fiction to escape reality (we've been hearing about Trump's antics on the news anyway, why do I need to read about him in my fiction too??), and B) makes the book/ movie/ TV series/ etc extremely dated in a few years' time.

[Kat ♡]

MET DEREK LANDY TODAY FOR HIS BOOK SIGNING AND I ASKED ABOUT SP10!

HE SAID THIS COULD BE ONE OF MANY MORE OMFG

[Atlas · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is how I'm going to die, she'd realised. On my knees

* * * *
4 / 5

I didn't expect for there to be a tenth book to the series, but I am very glad that there is. I think it has quite a different vibe to the previous few books and it's lacking a few old favourites (like Tanith or Scapegrace), but I did enjoy Resurrection. Whilst the plot isn't that great, maybe on par with Dark Days or one of the earliest books, it's made up for by a much more mature consideration of Skulduggery and Valkyrie.

"Skulduggery, you're my best friend and I love you"

Valkyrie Cain is an older, broken woman. After the events of Dying of the Light with Gant, she moves back to Ireland to live in Gordan's house with her dog, Xena. She's wracked with guilt for what has happened to her younger sister, Alice, and barely leaves the house. She avoids Roarhaven because of her association with Darquesse, murderer of mages. Valkyrie Cain lived for years with prophecies and worlds on her young shoulders and now she just wants to be left alone. I can't much blame her. Meanwhile, Skulduggery is futilely trying to pretend that nothing is wrong, that a good case will take them back five years to when they were the dream duo, saving the world left and right.

Valkyrie broke my heart. When I was younger, I wanted to be her, and so I fell into the same trap that Valkyrie Cain did: wanting to be someone, a hero, but saving the world is not fun, it breaks you. We are the same age in Resurrection which makes it even easier to understand her. There's this lovely quote right at the start of her POV:

The years, they had thundered by, heavy and unstoppable, a boulder rolling downhill. Bruises and broken bones and bloody knuckles and screams and laughs and tears. A lot of tears. Too many tears

Sounds a bit depressing, doesn't it? Never fear, Resurrection manages to balance this rather depressing, but realistic, outlook on Valkyrie and Skulduggery with good, Landy humour. The plot is entirely new, with new characters, rather than trying to rehash old characters and storylines. Roarhaven has grown, under the guiding hand of China Sorrows, into a full mage city complete with school for children. Attending this school is Omen Darkly, younger brother to Auger Darkly who is prophesied to have a courageous heart and to fight the King of the Darklands in a battle to decide the fate of humanity. He's recruited by Skulduggery to have a nosey into some strange goings on at the Academy; Omen is interesting, he's nice and pleasant in his own right but also serves as a reflection of Valkyrie when Skulduggery recruited her.

"You should have seen her, back in the good old days. She sparked. She was fearless."
"No," she said, 'I wasn't"
"You were fearless in every way that mattered," he responded. "You were magnificent. You were funny, and tough, and confident, and amazing. You did things no one else could do. You survived what no one else could survive. Just being around you made me a better person. And now look at what you've become"

The writing is, I think, the highlight of this book. It's so beautiful and thoughtful. There's so many amazing quotes that I want to share: funny ones, philosophical ones, sad ones. The best ones are, I think, about Skulduggery and Valkyrie's relationship. They aren't in love, obviously, but they love each other in a way that develops from shared burdens and suffering:

"Fight them. I'm begging you."
"I thought you didn't beg."
"You're my exception," she said. "You always were."

Essentially, Skulduggery Pleasant: Resurrection is a great addition to the series. It isn't as intense and wide-spanning as The Dying of the Light, not having as many links and connections to the other books, but it is fun, clever, and very enjoyable with some new additions to the cast and a great look at how some of the characters have aged.

Read this review and more on my blog: https://atlasrisingbooks.wordpress.co...

[Jess · Rating 5 out of 5]

10/02/2017

RESSURECTION.

29/07/2016

I WILL RISE AGAIN.

[Ryan Buckby · Rating 4 out of 5]

Oh my God.” Valkyrie shook her head. “I need to sit down.” “You are sitting down.” “I need to sit down more.

Just when i thought i was done with this series there goes another 5 books for the series that i now have to read because i'm not a quitter and always have to finish the series no matter what.

Plot: This series is getting so much more darker and mature and for me that is something that i love with how long we've been with Skulduggery and Valkyrie. Do i feel like i loved the ending for book nine and where it ended of course i did i feel like that book is where i was ready to say goodbye for good but sometimes you can't let a good series die. The events of this book are set five years after the ending of the dying of the light and Valkyrie is now in her 20s and is returning to her home after spending the passed 5 years in America. I'm glad there was a time jump from the previous one because it opens up a whole new world for extra story and it makes it feel like we were away from the characters for that amount of time.

Valkyrie has changed a lot since the first book in the series where she was only just 12 years old and is now in her early 20's and it really does feel like i've grown up with her throughout the series. She has come into her own over the course of the series and she is dealing with some guilt brought upon from the events of book nine and it has still stuck with her since. I think Valkyrie just moved to America to get away from her problems thinking it was an easy fix to forget and now that she is back it's like she now has to face what she's held off for so long. This shows in how she hasn't really spoken to her family or even skulduggery for so long and she's also completely stepped away from the magical world and she has a journey of self acceptance to make.

We get a whole bunch of new characters that are introduced in this book and i liked most of them that made an appearance at some stage. Omen Darkly is a character i can see myself really liking if he appears more going forward in the next 4 books of the continued series and i do hope that he has a much larger role and could possibly take over more of the role for Valkyrie possibly.


The tone for book ten was such a big shift from the previous books and i love the direction that the story looks like it's starting to go in and i am excited to see where Derek is going to take it next. The story itself just has the feel of much darker and grown up tones which i love because with Valkyrie now in her 20's things will definitely will be different to when she was in the teens/ late teens.


I'm really glad that i get to continue this story with more of this world and characters that i have come to love so much i also feel like the story could have ended at book nine and i would have been completely happy with it. The last book before this one had that finality about it with the characters that were left in a somewhat of a place where i feel like they should have ended up however i do hope that with how it's continuing that the main core values that this series great still shine through.

[Dana Salman]

2018:
You know the Pirates of the Caribbean films? I really like those movies. That is, I liked them when they were a trilogy, that had a nicely wrapped up story and a satisfying finish and a plot that made sense (whatever anyone else says about the second and third films being too "complicated"). There's two more movies now, but I like to just pretend they don't exist. Not because they're terrible or anything (I don't remember a thing from the fourth movie from how boring it was and I didn't watch the fifth), but because they're unnecessary and don't add anything to the franchise.

I'm going to do the same thing with this series. As excited as I was to hear there would be a continuation, I think I can comfortably accept book 9 as THE END of the story, because after reading reviews for Resurrection and the newly released Midnight I'm pretty much 100% positive I do NOT want to read these books... or really anything by Derek Landy ever again.
I'm not mad, I'm not even disappointed... I'm resigned. I've kind of gotten used to this feeling now and I know I'll feel that way about a lot of stuff for many years to come.


2016:
Maaaaan, there really should be more hype about this! Where all the gifs and fangasms? It's Skulduggery freaking Pleasant! HE IS BAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACK!!

*****

Ahhhh we have a cover!! Just look at it! I'm already dying! Skul and Val I missed you guys!

[Moonie · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars

There's a very bitter part of me that wanted to hate this, set it on fire, and be free from skeleton hell forever. She did not get her wish, but she will be writing parts of this review, lmao. So. To start with the less fun discoursey bits:

It is clear to me - that even though personal pleas were ignored and/or not handled well - the backlash against Desolation was heard and addressed. The representation in Resurrection is not perfect. But it's decent. It's an improvement. It's clumsy sometimes (Never's intro made me cringe, though it ended being fine, and "it's a black thing" felt .. uh, written by a white man, and i will really, really hope people will speak up about their personal marginalized experiences & Landy will listen and incorporate for future books), but ... it is so, so, so much better than the bullshit that was Desolation, and I will give credit where its due while still firmly saying that this isn't the end of the conversation. (Special kudos have to go to how the doctor and his husband were written, which was no big deal at all while also not glossing over the fact they were gay men.)

As for the actual book, it would rank among the lowest of the series for me; like with LSODM, I can not handle so many non Valkyrie pov chapters (although Omen ended up pleasantly surprising me!) i can't care, especially when these characters are brand new to me and mostly setting up plot things I don't remotely care about. There was some things that were plain old goofy ("princess of the darklands" ..............) and jokes that didn't work, and I still can't figure out how I feel about the chapters from the POV of a certain new American character.

That being said .....

OH MY GODDDD MY BABIES ARE BACK ;o;

i wish i could be professional about this, but i spent 15 minutes on the floor in tears at the halfway mark because I was too emotional to read anymore. the book was devastating and i loved it; the pay off was well worth it and a thing I have wanted for for SIX YEARS I FINALLY GOT, AND IT WAS BETTER THAN I EVER /DREAMED/. this book clearly suffers from being set up: it's clogged down by a lot of exposition and certain bits of emotional pay off means the vast majority of the book is incredibly sad and stressful, but it was worth it for me, ultimately. while I still feel like the dying of the light was a perfect ending and am still devastated about losing the "magic" bookends, i AM looking forward to where the series goes and how it's going to beat the highs and lows of phase one. (especially with a certain ship ................)

I was ready to accept I would never enjoy Skulduggery Pleasant again. I am ecstatic to be wrong.

(i swear to god if Valkyrie doesn't have more POV chapters in XI, i'm straight up ripping Sebastian's chapters out. )

[Ashley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Star Rating: —> 5 Stars

5 Stars as expected, as always ❤️

[Melissa · Rating 2 out of 5]

The short version is it was disappointing for a Skulduggery book but OK. Kinda wish he'd left the series alone but I'll still read the next one - though probably borrow it from the library instead of buying it.

First, my petty annoyances:
* Razzia sounds like she watched too much Crocodile Hunter and then took a severe blow to the head. I can only assume Landy's exposure to Australians is limited to tourists who spoke fullblown ocker just to mess with him. I've never heard anyone say strewth in any other circumstance, and "true blue"? Good lord, I cringed so hard I nearly passed out.
* I get that Omen is the everyman-who-rises-up-to-meet-the-challenge character (and if I didn't, characters constantly telling each other than "he might surprise you" would probably clue me in) but seriously. Is everyone beautiful or interesting or talented or powerful except Omen? Are no other sorcerers just average sorcerers? Is it that remarkable that he's unremarkable?
* I don't know enough about trans issues to be comfortable spouting a firm opinion on Never, so tentatively: I felt like Landy's treatment of the character was clunky, especially when compared to the smoothly included gay couple. I guess the way teenagers deal with their identity IS quite cringeworthy, so maybe it was deliberate.
* Lethe's speech is a speed reading nightmare with half of his words in italics. I get what Landy was going for here and that there was even a plot reason for it, but I *hated* reading it.

The big issues:
* Holy crap this book was flat. I get it, I really do. Valkyrie IS flat. She has PTSD and no freaking wonder. I appreciate the very realistic treatment of how she feels and how hard it is to get back into things and why there's a shortage of sparkling repartee from that corner. So... maybe make it up somewhere else? If Valkyrie can't banter then someone else needs to pick up the slack so the book doesn't just fall flat on its face.
* Wtf is Sebastian's deal. Those chapters were a waste of space. He's boring and he didn't do anything. I did like the Conrad bit though, providing there is follow up to that story in the future. If some chick is just in love with a garden-variety Hollow Man, that's dumb. She's clearly insane. But if this is the new stupid-recurring-subplot (aka the Scapegrace) then I'm down with that.
* Uuuuuuuugggghhhh enough of the Skulduggery vs Valkyrie plots. Yeesh. I liked evil loony Skulduggery and all, it's just... are they gonna fight each other and then pull each other back from the edge eeeeevery book? And oh man, another Administrator betrayal. Et tu, Tipstaff?

I know it sounds like there wasn't much I liked about this book. There kinda wasn't. It was clearly set up to be part of a series, with lots of unanswered questions and lots of new characters and worldbuilding rather than just spending some quality time getting to know and actually like any of the newbies. The old characters either had cameos or just off-screen mentions - sometimes even off-screen deaths.

I don't even know how to end this review, I feel a bit ... meh.

#TEAMCONRAD

[Feyre · Rating 5 out of 5]

MEIN HERZ! OH MEIN GOTT! DIESES ENDE! WIE TOLL WAR DAS BITTE?!
*räusper*
Ähem. Was wollte ich eigentlich sagen, bevor das Fangirl in mir diese Review an sich reißen konnte? Gefühlte Ewigkeiten ließ Derek Landy nach Band 9, der ja eigentlich der letzte sein sollte, auf neue Geschichten von Skulduggery und Walküre warten. Endlich endlich endlich gibt es mehr Futter und es enttäiuscht nicht.
Die Geschichte ist spannend, wird nicht langweilig, es tauchen neue liebenswürdige Charaktere auf, altbekannte Lieblinge geben sich die Ehre und Walküre und Skulduggery liefern sich ihre großartigen Wortgefechte. Und das Ende... das Ende hat mir zwischendurch ein wenig den Atem genommen. Es ist atemberaubend, erschreckend und rührend zugleich.
Hoffen wir, dass Herrn Landy die Ideen nicht so schnell ausgehen und das Skelett uns noch einige Jahre begleitet.

[Helen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Updated review (March 2018):

Okay, so I just read this book again for the Rereadathon, for the category 'read a book to give it a second chance', and I'm so glad I did, because I definitely enjoyed it a lot more the second time around.

I feel I may have initially done the book an injustice. I was so hyped for it that I read it extremely quickly and as a result found it convoluted and hard to follow - whereas this reread was spread over several days and that worked for me. While I still feel that there were too many subplots shoehorned in (the Hollow man romance, really?) I understood the main plot far better this time around.

I still loathe Never (not because of their gender identity - 90% of people who agree that Never is dreadful dislike them for being a 'special snowflake', whereas I dislike them because they are a prick). I think Abyssinia is a ridiculous villain. The American President storyline annoyed me and was clearly just a huge stab at Donald Trump - and I get it, we all hate Trump!! But WHY is this character necessary? This was definitely a setup book and I'm sure that question, along with some others, will be answered later, but it still bothered me. I understand and appreciate that Derek is vocal about his hatred for Trump on social media, but I don't feel it belonged in the book.

However, I felt like Valkyrie and Skulduggery were more themselves in this book than I remembered them being - Val has her issues, of course, but I saw bits of the old her glimmering through. I can see myself enjoying future instalments, after this slightly wobbly start. Omen Darkly also started to grow on me, though I found him highly irritating the first time around. The humour I remembered was more appreciated, and I started to like some of the new characters and disciplines more.

Overall I'm glad I reread this because I feel so much happier about the upcoming release of Midnight. This book had its problems and was definitely weaker than the other books in the series for me, but I did actually enjoy it this time.

Initially I didn't give this a star rating but I've decided upon a reread to give it 3.5 stars.

Original review (June 2017):

I just want to preface this review by saying that Skulduggery Pleasant defined my teenage years and it's a series that's incredibly close to my heart. That being said, it's very difficult to face the fact that I didn't enjoy this book anywhere near as much as I was expecting to, and I'm sad to have to say so.

First and foremost I found Resurrection to be incredibly difficult to follow. That may be partially my own fault because I blasted through it in about four hours flat with only one or two pauses for food and bathroom breaks, but I've found that the previous books tended to follow a set formula and whilst the plots were complex, I didn't have any difficulty following them. This book seemed to have an awful lot going on and it was all sort of crammed in, and while I understand that this is supposed to be a set-up for a whole huge reboot of a new Skulduggery series, I felt... a little cheated, in all honesty. I feel like I came out of this book with more unanswered questions than I started with and all of the things I was hoping/expecting to be addressed... kind of weren't? Perhaps answers will come in later books (and despite my disappointment you can bet your ass I'll be carrying on with these books because I can't let go of Skulduggery Pleasant. I won't.)

Okay so here are some things I liked about this book: firstly, VALDUGGERY. So. Much. Valduggery. IT LIVES!!! It brought a huge smile to my face to see them express their love and need for one another, and to quit dancing around how much they mean to one another. It was the highlight of the book, in all honesty.

Secondly, I liked that Derek didn't ignore the fact that Val is horrendously traumatised and suffering from PTSD. She is, in so many ways, a shadow of her former self. (That was also one thing I struggled with whilst reading this, but more on that later.) People have not forgiven her for everything that happened with Darquesse. She's still suffering, still hating herself, still struggling with the repercussions. It was realistic, because ultimately Valkyrie Cain has always been a very flawed character and not always had to face consequences for her behaviour, so the fact that she has not escaped unscathed was ultimately realistic in my opinion.

I liked that there was some representation of different sexualities and genders in this book. We have a genderfluid teleporter named Never, and a gay main character and his husband are integral to the plot. There were also some new characters of colour introduced, and things like that are always nice to see in a children's series.

Now, onto some of the things I didn't like. Firstly, aside from Skulduggery, Val, Fletcher and China, most of the recurring cast from previous books - those who survived, anyway - were conspicuously absent. Some of them were killed off in the intermission between books, which was saddening, because it feels like we never really got to say goodbye. I feel like that may become a plot point in later books, because I'm sure it wouldn't have just happened for the sake of it, but it still saddened me. I also found it frustrating that so many of my favourite characters, who I'd been excited to see again - Tanith in particular - didn't make an appearance at all. It seemed like they were kind of pushed off to one side to make room for all these new characters, whom I haven't yet formed a particular attachment to and struggled to care about anywhere near as much. Again I know that this is, in its own way, an entirely new series, but I do wish we'd had more than just a fleeting mention of so many characters I was hoping to see again.

Secondly, Skulduggery spends the vast majority of the book evil. Not in a Lord Vile sense either. He gets kind of possessed, drawn under the influence of another sorcerer, and as a result one of my favourite characters of all time spends almost an entire book wandering around acting almost completely out of character and rambling endlessly about god knows what. Honestly, I don't know if I was just reading too quickly or what, but he seemed to meander on and on without making much sense - and whilst Skulduggery's always been a talker, it's usually for the sake of being witty, whereas here he just seemed to babble on and on without much purpose. Also, I did find parts of the plot a little silly. The world is about to be destroyed by Skulduggery's evil ex-girlfriend?? Really?

I struggled with this book largely because Skulduggery and Val seemed to lose a lot of their spark. In terms of Valkyrie's change in personality, this is understandable and other characters address how drastically she's changed, how she seems to have become so bland and spineless - but it was still difficult to see one of my favourite characters become such a shadow of her former self and honestly I was struggling to root for her. By the end of the book it seems as though she's beginning to recover slightly from her ennui, so hopefully she'll regain some of her spark as the new series goes on. It was an understandable change, but a frustrating one.

Another thing I had an issue with is that there seemed to be a sudden dramatic advancement in the sorcerer community - new magical disciplines being discovered, huge technological advancements and so on and so forth. Whilst the new disciplines were interesting, and it's cool that Derek continues to build on the forms of magical abilities as the series goes on, I must admit I do miss the simplicity of just having Adepts and Elementals - now we have so many different classifications that it makes me a little dizzy. However, my main issue with this is that the sorcerer community has made more progress in the five years of Val's absence than it did in nearly ten years whilst she was a part of it. They have brand new technology and dozens of new things seem to have sprung up out of nowhere all of a sudden, and it all felt a little rushed. It seemed like decades worth of progress had sprung up in a very small amount of time and whilst I understand that it was meant to showcase how isolated Val had become and how things had moved on without her in so many ways, it did feel a little sudden. I feel like Derek had chosen to expand exponentially on the worldbuilding - perhaps to keep readers interested - when I adored the established world that had already been set up and would have been quite happy for it to remain the same as ever... but perhaps that's childhood nostalgia talking.

I have to say I don't know how I would have reacted to this book if I'd read it when I was younger. Perhaps I'm coming to outgrow the series, which is a devastating thought to be honest - but maybe that's what's happened to me. I just felt personally that this book just didn't deliver the same feelings I got from reading all of its predecessors. There were some aspects of the book that I greatly enjoyed and I will be carrying on with future instalments if only to see how the books progress... but much like Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, I'm not sure whether I'll be accepting the events of the new series as canon.

I mean no disrespect to those who enjoyed the book, I still have a great deal of admiration for the world and characters Derek Landy has created but I confess I'm not as in love with Resurrection as I had hoped to be. Sad times.

[Bilbo Baggins · Rating 2 out of 5]

Id never thought that a Skulduggery Pleasant book would get anything less than 5 stars.........
But here we are.

It just wasn't..... Ugh. Some things need to end when they are supposed to end. Ya know? Initially I was thrilled when this book was announced, but after rereading the series, I realized how much I didn't want anything to change. But Ya know, I'm not in charge of that haha. I don't have to read it, if I don't want things to continue 😂 so... Yeah...

Well....
It was just a huge disappointment...

[Sarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Oh my god I really don't know what to say. It just made me so happy to have my precious dorks back. Skulduggery's and Valkyrie's friendship is as always the ultimate friendship of all friendships and makes me feel all the feels. This series means so much to me and I love them all so much my heart's gonna explode. ok bye

[Duso · Rating 5 out of 5]

Let.them.kiss.
Damnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn.

[Dante Gallo · Rating 2 out of 5]

Skulduggery Pleasant ended... It was done, finished, story concluded, characters riding off into the sunset... And yet when the author ran out of money/ideas we got a resurrection... And what emerged from the grave was hideous and wrong.
I don't think I've ever given a Skulduggery Pleasant book lower than four stars before but this one really broke me. I can't stand it when authors return to their book series after few years when it was blatantly obvious that they had no prior intention to do so.

The Good (This won't take long):
1) Congrats to Derek Landy for including some gay and gender fluid characters in the main cast. This is quite a rare thing to have in young adult fiction when they aren't the main themes of the story. The gender fluid character was handled a little less seamlessly than the two gay characters but it's a start. I also thought that he handled Valkyrie's PTSD quite well by making it keenly obvious that she was suffering but not reducing her to a quivering mess who needed saving all the time. These are all tough subjects to write about and Landy did it admirably.

The bad:
1) Where the blazes was everyone? Landy has written nine books in this series and filled them with unique characters who we know and love yet he didn't include them at all! Instead he chose to waste everyone's time by making a plethora of bland characters who you forget about the moment you turn the page - China Sorrows got what, three pages worth of lines? This was such a stupid mistake to make, he's done the hard part in the previous books by building these characters up only to abandon them in the 'grand' Resurrection.

2) Stupid names - I get that sorcerers names where always odd: Ghastly Bespoke, Solomon Wreath, Dexter Vex, China Sorrows etc. but at least they were somewhat normal and pronounceable words... The names in this book were just stupid: Militsa Gnosis, Candaverous, Mehrbano, Parthenios Lilt... Am I really supposed to believe that people would pick these names for themselves?

3) There were two sub-plots in this book that were a complete and utter waste of my time and life. One was the authors personal rant at President Donald Trump that he didn't even attempt to disguise (we all have our personal feelings about the man but leave it out of a fantasy book). The other was so idiotic it involved a woman falling in love with a hollow man (a gas filled paper dummy). I ended up skipping these chapters.

4) Oman Darkly was supposed to represent the 'grey man'. The people who go through life being incredibly normal. No particular skills, no charisma and generally not much going for them in life... And as heart warming as it is to see these characters struggle though life and finally succeed in the end I still have one big problem with them... They're boring. Why dedicate so much page time to a boring character... You have walking skeletons and people who can teleport yet you focus on the grey man... If I want to see a coming of age tale I'll go read one - when I read Skulduggery Pleasant I want to see witty, larger than life characters... Not grey men.

In conclusion, this book should have never happened. It's a mark of strength for an author to create a vibrant and successful book series then know when to let it rest... It's a mark of weakness for them to return to the series years later and make a hash of it. This book doesn't answer any loose ends from the previous series, it doesn't give you a peak into the lives of the characters we love like Tanith Low or Solomon Wreath... It's just a poorly edited mess. It's also clear by the ending that Landy plans to continue this resurrection, because unfortunately, you can't keep a dead man down.

[Molly Mortensen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Resurrection starts out strong. Though I was afraid when Valkyrie's POV starts with her acting so crazy but her PTSD doesn't impact the book too much. Valkyrie and Skulduggery back together was perfect!

I liked the advances in magic and I'm Roarhaven (mage city). The school was fun and the new kid, Omen wasn't as annoying as I feared.

Many old characters were missing but I didn't mind. I figure they'll cameo later.

The Bad:

The new bad guys were too over powered with our protagonists too weakened.

At about halfway, Skulduggery and Valkyrie separate and the book goes downhill. They need to be together for the glorious banter!

The Sebastian (plague doctor) and US president parts were both stupid and pointless.

It was so much better than Dying of the Light though!

[Cornelia Johansson · Rating 4 out of 5]

I WOULD LITERALLY KILL FOR THIS BOOK

(okay, maybe not, but I still really want it)

update: not as good as the last two books in the series but still very very good. I like that we really get to se Valkyrie dealing with the fallout of what happened with Darquesse, and that it addressed how shitty it actually was of Skulduggery to allow a literal child in on his "adventures" and what consequenses it had. Also inclusion of actual confirmed lgbt characters, yay!

Did not like as much that we got a bunch of new characters but barely got to see any of the old favorites (dexter, saracen, tanith, the monster hunters, just a short apperance of fletcher)

[Aleshanee · Rating 5 out of 5]

BÄMM. Was für ein Neustart!

Nach dem abschließenden, sehr genialen neunten Teil der Skulduggery Reihe dachte ja jeder, jetzt ist Schluss. Sehr schade, aber es war so ein mega tolles Reihenfinale - und wie sehr hab ich mich gefreut, dass Derek Landy doch wieder die geliebten Charaktere "auferstehen" lässt! :D

In der Verlagsinfo steht ja, dass Neueinsteiger problemlos ohne Vorkenntnisse mit diesem Band starten können und dass es auch eher eine "neue Reihe" ist - dem kann ich mich allerdings nicht anschließen. Es wird zwar alles gut erklärt und ich denke mir, dass man mit der Handlung gut mitkommt - aber es wird sich doch immer wieder auf die vorherigen Ereignisse bezogen, so dass man da vieles nicht verstehen wird, wenn man die Vorgeschichte nicht kennt.

Es beginnt wie man es gewohnt ist: actionreich, brutal und mit viel Sarkasmus! Natürlich sind
Walküre Unruh und Skulduggery Pleasant wieder mit von der Partie, aber ebenfalls eine wichtige Rolle nimmt der 14jährige Omen Darkley ein.
Omen ist der jüngere Zwilling von Auger Darkley, dem Auserwählten, der in naher Zukunft die Welt retten soll. In dessen Schatten aufgewachsen fühlt Omen sich immer zweitrangig, unwichtig und unerwünscht. Dabei hat er sich eigentlich ganz gut mit seinem Leben arrangiert, denn trotz der hohen Stellung seines Bruders liebt er ihn und sie haben ein gutes Verhältnis zueinander. Als Omen jedoch den Geschmack von Abenteuer und Geltung kennenlernt, kann er nicht einfach wieder zurück in sein Schneckenhaus kriechen.

"Die Angst ist wie kaltes Wasser, das durch deine Adern rauscht -
wenn du dich nicht bewegst, wird das Wasser zu Eis." S. 23

Stephenie bzw. Walküre hat sich ja auch zurückgezogen, lebt geradezu isoliert und ist nicht wirklich glücklich darüber, dass sie wieder in ihre früheren Fußstapfen treten soll. Doch Skulduggery hat ganz andere Pläne und die setzt er auch durch - andere Optionen gibt es für ihn nicht; wer sollte sich auch seinen Wünschen widersetzen?
Der Schlagabtausch der beiden ist wieder mal sowas von genial, triefend vor Ironie und schwarzem Humor, witzig, spritzig und super amüsant! Auch wenn Walküre eher ruhigere Töne anschlägt, geprägt durch ihre Erfahrungen und sie jetzt mit 24 wohl auch einfach erwachsen geworden, macht es Spaß das wortspielerische Tauziehen der beiden zu verfolgen!

"Es kommt immer etwas Großes und Schlimmes auf uns zu", konterte Walküre.
"Manchmal bist du es und manchmal bin ich es." S. 24

Natürlich begegnet man auch bekannten Charakteren aus den Vorbänden, aber es sind auch wieder neue dabei und wie immer absolut originell und außergewöhnlich. Auch die Gegenspieler des Sanktuariums haben mal wieder nichts geringeres als die Weltherrschaft im Blick und haben dafür abstruse und wirklich finstere Aktionen auf dem Plan, die einige Überraschungen bereithalten.

Das alles wird wie gewohnt äußerst unterhaltsam beschrieben, wobei sich der Autor hier verschiedenen Perspektiven bedient. Die Kapitelübergänge sind kreativ gewählt und haben immer irgendwie einen Bezug zueinander, ein super Bonuspunkt! Ich liebe ja mittlerweile seine Schreibweise, die flott und erfrischend ist, voll gepackt mit Sarkasmus und einer komplexen Handlung, die gut durchdacht ist und bei der man den roten Faden nicht verliert. Wie oben schon erwähnt wäre es aber wirklich besser, die Vorgeschichte zu kennen, da man sonst vielleicht nicht immer den Durchblick hat.

Insgesamt wieder eine "klassische Derek Landy" Mischung mit viel Action, Wortwitz, Spannung, extremen Charakteren und neuen Eigenheiten, die wieder frischen Wind in die Geschichte bringen. Einfach nur großartig, ich bin absolut begeistert!

Am Ende gibts noch ein kleines Glossar zur Magie und eine Kurzbeschreibung der wichtigsten Personen.

© Aleshanee
Weltenwanderer

[Emily Rennie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I started reading this series when I was 11 years old - I got the first one as a Christmas present and fell in love immediately. From then I was obsessed, finishing the new one in a day and then having to wait a whole year for the next one (no regrets). So when the 'final' book came out two years ago I had no idea what I was going to do with myself.

...And then Derek Landy announced this. Resurrection. A new era of the Skulduggery series.

I was a little apprehensive. Excited, but nervous. I can honestly say that I loved this and it was so, so good to be back. I was a little sad at the lack of the original team - there's no Tanith, Monster Hunters, Scapegrace, Clarabelle, Val's family...And way too little Fletcher Renn for my liking. There's a whole host of new characters, some great and memorable, some not so much. I enjoyed Omen and Never, I loved Richard and his search for his husband (you're getting better at good representation Derek), and I eagerly await more news of this new villain.

Reading how much Val has changed was sad and difficult, but amazingly written. Derek captures her PTSD and guilt so well. It was just a joy to be back in the world of Skulduggery Pleasant again. So...when's the next book?

[Katie.dorny · Rating 4 out of 5]

I genuinely don’t understand why some people hated this book. I loved it!!
And I’m slightly valduggery trash; but in a platonic way I promise.
Also Omen Darkly is adorable and I hope he’s a recurring character.
Here Valkyrie is a lot more mature and my age - which made her very relatable for me. Her PTSD and return from America was so realistic and quite harrowing in some places. Don’t read this if you’re looking for a light hearted fantasy book.

[Книжни Криле · Rating 4 out of 5]

„Скълдъгъри Плезънт 10: Възкръсване”! Дерек Ланди и „Студио Арт Лайн” връщат към живот саркастичния скелет, който се изправи срещу легиони от безсърдечни врагове и завладя сърцата на легиони фенове. „Възкръсване” е хем продължение, хем ново начало, за което ни обещават че „няма да завърши добре”... Прочетете ревюто на "Книжни Криле": https://knijnikrile.wordpress.com/201...

[Daisy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Quality Rating: Four Stars
Enjoyment Rating: Five Stars

Of course, the release of Resurrection worried me immensely: what if my beloved series was getting pulled out too far, too thin, what if it wasn't quite the same anymore? But, even though Roarhaven and the magical community is very, very changed from what we left, even though there are new characters and altered favourites, even though the tone is a little different, the heart and soul of the Skulduggery Pleasant series is there. We weren't coming back for the same thing, and Derek knew that. Resurrection is an evolution of the series we know and love that was needed if the story was to carry on. And I'm very glad they did.

I've always been impressed with Derek's style of writing, and each time I read his new book I'm reminded how much he's developed and grown. To fuel his ego even more, we'll call it slick. I especially love how the end and beginning sentences of each chapter often reflect one another; it's like a film where the same word of a sentence has been edited between scenes. It's especially satisfying if you're marathoning the book like I was, so you catch the little jokes between pages.
The political satire is also on point. More than ever, Derek's humour is taking in contextual references which - while not always necessary for a joke to work - makes it all the funnier. It was toeing the boundaries of how far jokes can go at times, but nothing was too much. I just hope it doesn't lean over too far in the future.

The world of Skulduggery Pleasant is pretty broad now, and I think it's wonderful that you can casually teleport around the world and it doesn't feel like a big step. You can have these fantastically crazy magical abilities and people and it fits perfectly well with everything else. Derek is very good with tone and things rarely feel out of place, even if they seem pretty dramatic out of context. Speaking of which, the stakes are raised really high almost immediately in this book. I was smiling, so happy to be back in this world, and then suddenly woah, okay things are already going disastrously wrong. Good old Val and Skulduggery spreading friendly chaos everywhere.
And chaos it definitely it, but not the happy-go-lucky chaos that exists for as long as it's needed and then miraculously gets resolved in a few pages. It's been five years since we left the Ireland of The Dying of the Light, and things have changed because of what happened. Val has changed. We get a proper look at what it's like for an individual to continue after these heroic, but quite frankly terrible things happen, as well as how it makes other people react to them. More on that later. But it's not in the 'oh great everything's really sad now, where's the fun in it.' Don't worry Derek has plenty of wisecracks to keep you smiling.

Now when I heard that Resurrection was going to have a mo0stly new cast I became a little bit bitter. Little bit. But, I admit, with reluctance, that the new characters are pretty cool too. They're still not Tanith and the others (emphasis on Tanith), but I do admit it took about three/four books for me to warm up to her so I'm willing to give these guys a chance.
Seeing Val again was bizarre considering I grew up with her - like I always say, this series was my Harry Potter. Only my Fantastic Beasts actually features the original protagonist, only five years older and struggling with some dark stuff. Just the way I like it. As a representation of mental illness being featured in a story without it having to be the main plot point, this does pretty damn well. Derek tells the exciting action-adventure story, but he's always taken the effects violence has on people seriously. Val's depression and anxiety are definitely a driving force of some of this book, but they're things that try and test her character along the way, not purely a plot point.
Speaking of, Derek also twisted the 'Chosen One' story in a nice direction. If you've read The Rest of Us Just Live Here, you'll have an idea of what Omen's starting point is like; the painfully ordinary twin of the Chosen One. Ouch. But, of course, Omen becomes a lot more than that. I was really happy, first of all, with the fact that the whole deal of throwing kids into adult wars and fights has been realised to maybe not be the best idea. Not they're just being stubborn and going into it themselves, it seems. But secondly, as much as Omen changes, Derek didn't make it about becoming a hero like his brother. It was about Omen becoming whoever he wanted to be regardless of where he started, and that's just as valuable. You don't have to become the thing that you're not to be important.

All in all, I'm very glad to have some Skulduggery back in my life (not that I've been rereading the series on repeat or anything). It took a series that is very dear to my heart, and quite frankly awesome, and turned it into something a little bit new without losing the feel of the original series. My only criticism: where's my Tanith and when do I get her back?

[Nikki · Rating 5 out of 5]

A BIG SKELETON THUMBS UP FROM ME!!

[Rosie · Rating 1 out of 5]

you would think that by this point authors would know not to keep going after the "final" book. Resurrection is frankly terrible, torpedoes the sentimental value of the sacrifices of the last book, is completely dry and unfunny and is, in all honesty, extremely dull. The characters are boring, the plot is trite and worn out. I'm actually really bummed because Skullduggery Pleasant was my favourite book series as a kid and this reads like bad self-insert fan fiction written by a thirteen year old. I have genuinely never not finished a Skullduggery book before, but this was just so clunky and bad (the extremely bad political allusion, for example, was a waste of pages, poorly written and out of place) that it's essentially tainted the rest of the series for me- something I've enjoyed since I was eight years old.

[freddie · Rating 3 out of 5]

3-3.5 stars, I think.
Overall... Kinda disappointed by this.
I adore this series and its characters a lot, but this book felt a little bit sloppy.

[Emily · Rating 3 out of 5]

ACK OK I HAVE ABOUT 789 FEELINGS AND THEY'RE NOT ALL POSITIVE.

SO.

THIS BOOK.

{Also seriously, DO NOT READ WHAT IS UNDER THE SPOILER TAGS IF YOU HAVEN'T READ ALL THE BOOKS INCLUDING THIS ONE. Seriously, man. Sometimes I just dip under spoiler tags for the lolz, if it's a book I think I'll never read, BUT DON'T DO IT HERE, SAVE YOURSELF AND READ THE BOOKS, OK? OK.}

Not sure where to begin?? Probably with my expectations for Resurrection. They were high, fam. Really high. I finished my Skulduggery reread riding the crest of The Dying of the Light and screeching things like "THIS SERIES IS COMPLETELY PERFECT", so to come back in at book #10, five years after the events of TDotL, was always going to be a challenging one. There is a part of me that feels like this book didn't need to happen. We were all pumped for the FINALE, The Dying of the Light. It happened. It was wonderful. Then the Demon Road trilogy was published and we all tried to move on with our lives. Then, last summer, Landy dropped the bombshell via vlog that there'd be a Book 10.

Characters' lives continue after the final book ends. But does that mean the story needs to continue?

The principle on which Resurrection hangs is that even when one villain is defeated, there will be more. Evil didn't end when Book 9 ended. The world still needs to be saved. This is different to the Harry Potter series, for example. When it ends, I think we all feel that good HAS won and, now that that's over, the stakes can never be as high again. (That's why I didn't read The Cursed Child.) But The Dying of the Light definitely leaves things open. There are bad guys in it who don't really get stopped, who come back in Resurrection. Threats go on.

I think this is kinda cool, because it shows reality: the world always will be a bad place. When one threat is vanquished, another arises to take its place. But did it work in practice in Resurrection? I think I actually have to say no.

For one thing, I thought the existence of the Neoterics was implausible. "I know what you're thinking. I thought it, too. How could it even exist? How could an organisation like this be responsible for centuries of murder and upheaval and yet no one knows anything about them? ... They're careful. They're unbelievably, impossibly careful to not leave any fingerprints that'd lead people like you back to them." (p196)

Yeah. UNBELIEVABLE and IMPOSSIBLE sounds about right. I know I said all that stuff about liking the realism of evil not being stopped once and for all, but also, this seemed like a bit of a cheap move to pull, OH LOOK THERE'S THIS SECRET SECRET THING THAT'S BEEN HAPPENING THE WHOLE TIME. AND THE DARKLY PROPHECY. Not to mention the magic. We spend nine books lauding Fletcher for being the Last Teleporter, and then boom, hey Nero, who's way better than him?? How can there be these incredibly powerful sorcerers completely in the shadows? I mean, bringing Abyssinia back to life? Seriously? Plus the whole ex-girlfriend thing ... really?

And I think Landy kinda knew that, knew that these villains seemed a bit unrealistic and we couldn't quite take them seriously. That's why he turned Skulduggery against us with Smoke's corruption. OK, that was horrifying. I wanted to die. Skul trying to kill Val? It was AWFUL. I could've cried. Gosh.

Hmm, what else. Omen. So. I was a bit concerned that Omen would slide in and be best mates with Skul and Val, and I'd get ridiculously jealous, but that didn't happen, fortunately. I did like Omen. He was cute. Though I have to say, Corrival Academy felt tremendously like Hogwarts. There were a heap of differences, but it still did, in its essence.

Temper Fray was cool. I'm a big fan.

But I really missed all our other friends from the previous books?? Whyyyyy did we not hang out with them more?

ALSO. TIPSTAFF. THIS LITERALLY BROKE MY HEART. I LOVED HIM. WHY, DEREK, WHY. HOW LONG DID YOU KNOW THIS WOULD HAPPEN? FROM THE START? TIPSTAFF HAD MY HEART, DAMMIT.

ALSO. Is Darquesse actually gonna come back, a la Sebastian Tao's plan??? Because that a) seems plausible, because I did sort of think she was defeated easily in book 9, but b) is utterly terrifying and c) cheapens what they achieved in book 9, and how will she ACTUALLY ever be stopped?

So. If even Landy knew that the villains and stuff weren't much compared to what we faced in Book 9, what was the point of this book? I guess it was really a vehicle for Valkyrie to come to terms with everything that had happened to her. And I liked that, I did. But I sort of feel like we already covered a lot of that stuff in the last book? I loved seeing Skul and Val's relationship in this one, but it's not like it exactly developed in this book, it didn't deepen, really, because by book 9 it's as deep as they get. So I'm left not entirely sure what I was meant to get from Resurrection. I'm left not entirely sure why it needed to happen. I'm left not entirely sure that I wouldn't've been happier for things to end at #9.

AND YET I STILL REALLY ENJOYED IT. Of course I did. I would read anything featuring Skulduggery and love it. Seriously. But ... oh. I had issues. Still, I'll go into #11 with a positive attitude, and hope things amp up to be as wonderful as they were before!

[Canksilio · Rating 3 out of 5]

Unfortunately, I was fairly disappointed by this book. It wasn't a bad book, but it definitely wasn't up to the bar set by the rest of the series, and it honestly felt like more of a setup book than anything. I enjoyed it for the classic Val and Skulduggery banter, and learning more about the world itself, but the plot and new characters I'm not exactly blown away by. I'm going to go into some specifics about what I wasn't too fond of in this book, so spoilers ahead. Do not read this review if you intend on reading the book at any point. Keep in mind I don't usually write reviews, so if it seems unstructured or weirdly written then that is probably why. This is more just a way for me to record my thoughts than to review for other people.

Something that I noticed pretty quickly that annoyed me was just how much this book pandered. There's a gay couple, which I thought was handled pretty tastefully and actually quite liked. Then there's the genderfluid student Never, and Valkyrie has a miniature rant about how everyone is sexist, racist bigots that elected a narcissistic psychopath as the president of the U.S. I'm not joking here, as much as I wish I was. I'm aware that a lot of people are angry about Trump, and I'm aware that Derek probably has strong political opinions, but I really wish he kept them seperate from his series about magic and living skeletons.

As well as that, the book also felt quite weak in terms of both characters and plot. Temper Fray and Omen Darkly appear for the first time in this book, and though it appears to be pushing them as new additions to the crew, I didn't really like them all that much. Temper is a fairly flat character, and didn't have any discernable personality like Tanith, The Monster Hunters and the Dead Men do, despite filling the void they left in this book. He was in fact quite weak, and we don't even get to see his magic as far as I remember. Omen feels like the self insert of a lonely highschool nerd, and his character is pretty flat and boring as a result. He's lazy, he's not very smart or talented, and he's a bit stupid in the way he does things. He felt like he had a seriously thick layer of plot armour on him through the entire book, especially at one particular point where he actually manages to save Temper Fray singlehandedly. The side characters like Never were either annoying and dislikeable, or flat and uninteresting. Hilariously, Auger Darkly, Omens brother and subject of a prophecy where he saves the world, is almost completely ignored during the book yet is more interesting than any of the other new characters despite it seemingly trying to pull him out of the spotlight.

The plot of this book is all over the place, with random red herrings all over the place and nothing of actual note happening during the entire book. There's a subplot where a man in a plague doctor outfit tries to bring Darquesse back, and his path is almost completely unexplored by the end of the book. There's a subplot about the Trump-like president and how he is using sorcerers to influence the minds of congress so that he can pass things through that normally wouldn't, and it is left at a cliffhanger at the end of the book. There's a subplot about China's attitude towards her new position as Supreme Mage, and how she is abusing and getting too comfortable with her power, which disappears as soon as it is mentioned. There is a new Church of the Faceless, presented in a way that seems important yet leading to absolutely nothing. Valkyrie has a fragment of Darquesse still trapped within her, somehow able to affect the environment in certain ways and yet is completely invisible to everyone else. And the main plotline where a group of mortal haters attempt to resurrect a previously unmentioned ex-girlfriend of Skulduggery. Which ends with her being resurrected and going into hiding. Honestly, nothing is concluded at the end of the book. Just a whole lot of startups. Also, there is a very annoying cop-out moment at the end of the book where a power that previously was able to compel Skulduggery into doing what he was told just doesn't work, because he loves Valkyrie too much or something. Pretty stupid.

I hope that the next book actually has some substance, because this was quite a disappointing return to the series, and right now I'm not convinced it should've come back.

[Darcy (Daydreamingofbookdragons) · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was good, but it also took me 19 days to read when it should have taken 4 at the most. I really, really wanted to love this, but I found myself kind of bored and up until the end could only read a few chapters at a time until I wanted to do something else. Oh, but I did appreciate all the jabs at Trump. Derek Landy clearly has opinions.

[Jessica (aus.fangirl.reads) · Rating 5 out of 5]

*Reread December 2017*
I was so lucky to be able to buddy read this book with my fellow Dead Girls Kristy Rach & Nildene.
It was great to be able to share thoughts and just have others to talk about this amazing series with.

First Read June 2017*
“Skeleton adventures are different. There’s more room for puns.”

I started reading the Skulduggery Pleasant series back in 2007 when I was 14. I fell in love with the series and followed its releases religiously every year until 2014, when the series came to an end and I went through a major reading slump, seriously I didn’t read another book for 3 months... 3 MONTHS!

So when I heard the announcement that Derek was going to be restarting the series again, I was so excited. Thus started the 11 month wait for the release. And man was the wait worth it!
With this being the 11th book in the series it is hard to talk about without giving away spoilers but I will try my best to just fangirl without giving away details. I might do another review at some point with me going into more detail of the plot.

Derek Landy has managed to write a book that’s the same as the rest of the series but with changes that, not only add to the story, but show just how much he has excelled as a writer. Putting it another way, he has managed to change the series while keeping it the same. (It is so hard to explain!)

Resurrection is full of action and comedy, with constant twist and turns, just like any good mystery book should have.

The characters are all different and are so interesting that you don’t know if you should love them or hate them, so you end up doing what I did, loving them until they hurt you and then you class them as a villain.

With this being a restarting of the series we do get a fair few of our old favourite characters back like Valkyrie Cain, Skulduggery Pleasant and China Sorrows. We also get mentions of other original characters which made me very happy, but along with the old we get the new. There are many new characters but the main one I want to talk about is Omen Darkly.
When I found out there was going to be a new character hanging out with Valkyrie and Skulduggery, I wasn’t sure what to expect, but after reading the book and finding out him and learned his personality, I rather like him and am looking forward to seeing what trouble he gets into as the series goes on.

Getting back to the original crew I just want to mention one more thing... if Valkyrie and Skulduggery could just stop being so perfect together that would be just great! My emotions could not take some points in this book and I will be totally honest when I say I cried a fair few times, I cried and felt my heart break.

Which is to be expected when reading a book by Derek Landy.

The writing was creative and clever with its descriptions of certain places and locations, with the whole book taking place (mostly) in a made up location it was easy to get lost in the book without thinking about whether this location actually exists (this is something I do a lot).
All I can say is this series could do no wrong (I am a huge Skulduggery Pleasant fan so this is just a given), and to me this was a well written book and one that kept this fan happy and content with how the story progressed.

Rating: 5/5 stars- Amazing! I loved it!

I loved Resurrection and am so excited to continue with this series, if you haven’t read the Skulduggery Pleasant series I am always going to recommend it, especially if you love fantasy, comedy and action.
Now if you please excuse me I’m going to listen to Heroes by David Bowie until my heart heals from this book!

Happy reading everyone!
Jess



I decided to keep my notes from when I originally finished reading
Derek you amazing man! You brought back a series and have managed to change it but still keep it the same, still with all the sass, comedy and action as the last books and still managing to break my heart.

I am dying to talk about spoilers, but I won't because that would be unfair to all the lovers of this series who haven't had a chance to experience it yet.

All I can say is that I'm looking forward to reading the next book (when ever that will be released) and seeing where all this is heading!

BUT GOSH DAMN IT WAS AWESOME!!!

[jay · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't know if it's because I have reread this immediately after finishing Until The End or if it's just me being in my Bones Era™ again, but this was better than I remembered it being?

I also feel like it was more like the earlier books in the sense that there was one clear plot happening instead of ten thousand different things going on all over the place, which I appreciate.


Knowing the plot of book 15 also changed my outlook on some of the characters - I think I like Omen now?

Also the Sebastian Tao chapters are really funny when you know who he is.
I was actually curious if anyone figured his identity out beforehand and went on Reddit and there was a person who was like "I think it's [redacted], but it's kinda a stupid theory." I hope this person feels very validated now lmao, what's it like being smarter than the rest of us (or maybe just me, maybe all of you made the connection years ago and I was just sitting there.)


This is probably also by far the saddest Skulduggery book out there, like the vibes are so off and just keep deteriorating. I liked that though, the angst. Maybe I wasn't depressed enough when I first read it but I definitely am now ✨


Anyway. My favourite Valduggery moments in this (cause does anything else matter? obviously not):

🚨 Also I am spoiling like everything so, beware, I guess. And you probably won't enjoy it this if you're not a shipper, but that's not my fault and you entirely have yourself to blame. 🚨


- Skulduggery just desperately trying to bring Valkyrie back. "I've been trying to get you to be yourself since you came home. Nothing's worked, has it? You still won't come back to me."
Evil Skulduggery freely talking about his feelings 💯

- "I'm a better detective with you as my partner and I'm a better person with you as my friend."

- "I need you, Valkyrie. And you need me." "Do I?" "You'd be lost without me." so true bestie

- "So why not leave her alone?" "Because we're caught in a loop, Valkyrie and I. A very destructive loop."

- the whole subplot about Richard and his husband being five years apart and how it means nothing to their bond as a not so subtle nod to how Skul and Val have also been apart for five years and it means nothing to their bond ❤️

- "Skulduggery you're my best friend and i love you."

- "Fine." "Fine?" "If you've got to kill me then I'd rather you do it than somebody else."
once again just love the vibes when one of them turns evil and threatens to kill the other. AS IF YOU COULD KILL THE LOVE OF YOUR LIFE, PLEASE. but the oh so glorious tension and the opportunity every single time to snap out of it because they love the other so much 💯 I don't even care how often Landy is reusing that, it's fantastic content every single time.

- "I thought you didn't beg." "You're my exception. You always were."
crying
also him brushing a strand of her hair off her face in the same scene?? that's the quality content I deserve

- absolutely love when she tells him "I love you." when he's about to kill her. and him snapping out of it and saying "I love you, too." finally, after we didn't get a "I love you, too" in The Dying of the Light. Phase II Val and Skul really say "I love you" a lot and I am so here for it!!

- "I missed that sound," he said.
"What sound?"
"You. Laughing. I haven't heard you laugh in... a while."
meanwhile I am crying!!
also the continued exchange
"Maybe you should try being funnier."
"Oh, I sincerely doubt that it's my fault."
such idiots those two

- "Are you with me?" he asked.
She looked up at him. "Until the end," she said."