Skulduggery Pleasant

Series: Skulduggery Pleasant, Book 1

By: Derek Landy / Narrated By: Rupert Degas

Length: 7 hrs and 15 mins

Oh how wonderful! Excellent writing with BeYONd excellent narration make for such a fun ride!

Ya know? I reeeeally do NOT know why I buy some audiobooks over others. But I’m thinking that: Well, jeez, I truly can’t say No to a Sale. Gimme a compelling premise or delightful cover art, add a sale price tag, and dude! that puppy’s in my Cart soooo fast. That said… uhm, it generally takes me, like, forEVER to get around to listening to this that the other, huh?

So huzzah for having a large Library, decent enough so that I have a PLEthora of audiobooks to offer for Tell Me What’s Next… and this time? Skulduggery Pleasant was chosen over three others that seemed to be mighty fine Listens.

I kinda sorta, like, didn’t know what I was getting into, so let’s start off with First Impressions, shall we?

Rupert Degas, the awesome narrator of A Zoo in My Luggage starts this off where I was rather thinking: Oops, Irish accent, I shall HAVE to listen at x1 speed, which is sooo NOT m’ style. But then? Oh my good golly gosh, this starts off whizbang sharp and it never lets go from there. One Sitting Listen? You bet!

12-year old Stephanie Edgely is a trifle bummed. Okay: Big Time Bummed. She was pretty much the only person in the family who could handle being around her uncle Gordon as he had a tendency towards eccentricity… and not giving a rat’s patoot about what other people thought. But the two of them together, Uncle and Niece? Why, she loved him dearly… and now he’s dead. At the reading of the Will (Which Stephanie is confused that she was told specifically to attend), Gordon has dissed his money-grubbing siblings (Except her Dad—Gordon’s brother—and Mom who’ve received his villa and a bit else). But for Stephanie? She now owns his rambling estate, bucks, and royalties from all the delightfully weeeeeird books he wrote. She’s confounded, and a wee bit titillated as well.

Upon wheedling a night’s stay at the big ol’ house, a threatening call, a break-in by a maaaaad demonish creature hellbent on finding SOMEthing, has the only non-family dude ALSO at the reading of the Will coming to her rescue. Balls of Fire! Special bullets! Mayhem and Destruction!

Instantly I was smitten.

To add to my Instantly Smitten-ish Joy is the fact that what author Derek Landy has crafted as the entire rest of the book is just flat-out FUN!

I can’t tell you just how very much Action there is. And most impressively: The WorldBuilding, the Magic Systems, the Magical Objects are spot-on Non-Head Scratchers. It all makes perfect sense as you go along, and it’s like being swept up in a tide of self-effacing quips and intelligently hiLARious repartee.

You never know whom to trust as our hero Skulduggery Pleasant, a kinda sorta… okay… a TOTAL skeleton… has peeved off pretty much EVERYbody during his several hundred years as a detective. Stephanie finds herself as his sidekick… okay… she throws herself in as sidekick, and he doesn’t have much say in it… and as the story progresses, as glass is shattering ALL THE TIME, and things explode, and repurposed Non-Lifeforms come at the two and their kinda sorta friends… well, Stephanie has several bouts of: Am I good enough? How on earth am I going to conduct m’self.

So she grows and evolves along the way, and there’s nothing more empowering to a young girl Listening to this story than that! And hey: Good for young boys to hear about Rockin’ Chicks as well. As a matter of fact? I cannot think of ANYone who wouldn’t find this enchanting and entertaining. Girls, Boys, Kidlets, People in their 50s who got a My Next Listen Mandate. You know, EVERYONE!

And Rupert Degas? MASTERFUL performance, I can’t tell you just how beyond delightful he is. There are a multitude of characters, few of them human (Tho’ Degas does indeed do a touching Dad who’s worried about his much-loved daughter), each of them are super-intelligent with quirky and cutting things to say, and goodness, dialogue is whip-smart and urgent as all descends into chaos… and even MORE glass shattering. Many a window explodes in a shower of glass, many a building or cliff is fallen from. I don’t sit in a chair as I listen to audiobooks, so the nearest I can come to saying it? I was on the edge of my pillow! Action Action FUNNY Action and More FUNNY! Degas is Superb!!! And dooo stay for the verrrry end of the story for Skulduggery’s Tell-All Interview. So clever!

I can tell you: This Is Wonderful, and you can believe it cuz you know me. I Listen to a TRILLION audiobooks, so I do know m’ way around a good story. But if that ain’t enough for you: Read the Raves elsewhere. And for cripe’s sake, just laugh when you get to the top-rated Pass On This Review cuz that one says this ain’t anywhere near as fun as the stupendous Rick Riordan. Uhm, really? You’re gonna compare this to Riordan??? The dude who had to write several eye-rollers before giving YA a shot?

Nooooo! Just give this a listen… but ONLY if you wanna be entertained like crazy.

Or DON’T give this a listen…

Cuz, dude! you’re gonna wanna get the rest in the series and listen to them all, like, NOW!