Skulduggery Pleasant: The Faceless Ones

The Faceless ones is the third in the Skulduggery Pleasant series. For those of you who have never read any of these, here are the basics:

Skulduggery Pleasant – a detective for the other world who is actually a skeleton who is held together by magic. He does not remember how he came to be as he is, but he spends his days fighting crime and saving the world from evil. Skulduggery was the friend of Stephanie’s uncle.

Stephanie Edgely (aka Valkyrie Cain) – is the niece of a famous novelist who apparently had more than his imagination available for the creation of his stories. Stephanie inherits her uncles estate after his untimely death, only to her surprise, she inherits just more than weath and material goods. Skulduggery seems to have been thrown into the bargain and she becomes his apprentice in crime fighting (greatly reducing the odds of a long life).

China Sorrows – A “librarian” who has a lot of sides to her you just don’t want to meet. Status as good or evil: variable.

Tanith Low – a warrior (one of the good guys)

The Sanctuary – The Law of the magical world. These are supposed to be the good guys, but don’t always act the part.

There are sundry other characters vital to the story, but these are the main ones. Skulduggery and Stephanie are fighting to prevent the ancient gods, The Faceless Ones, from being recalled to earth. Their return would bring about the ultimate destruction of the world so it’s kind of vital that they do. In The Faceless Ones, the an organization known as the Diablerie returns to try and bring The Faceless Ones back into the world using teleporters to aid them in the creation of a portal from one world to the next. Stephanie and Skulduggery are alone in their fight against the Diablerie as the Sanctuary has cut Skulduggery off and hired another, rather inept detective. The story heats up as all three parties search for the last of the teleporters who are vital to everyone’s plans.

Personally, I’m quite fond of this series. I love the dry humour, I love the one liners, I love that they’re easy to read and relaxing and don’t take themselves too seriously. If you’re looking for a fun, light read, (or are in the target YA age range) this is a great series. 4/5