Playing with Fire by Derek Landy

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This is a crazy book series, but I like that about it. A lead character who is a sorcerer whose body is skeletal. A thirteen-year-old girl who stays out all night fighting evil creatures and sends her reflection to school as a stand in. Heinous, and I do mean heinous villains who don't mind exploding people, along with psychopathic assassins with Southern accents who can dig through the ground and who have a favorite straight razor. Yup. That's what this book is about.

I think that this one is a lot more dark, violent and disturbing than the first book, so I'd definitely warn a parent to read it first before letting a kid younger than twelve read this. The narrator was great. I loved his accents and how he makes these very strange characters stand out. I like his intonation for Skulduggery, rather sarcastic and one of those people who really don't panic. If he does, then you're in trouble. I enjoy his relationship with Valkyrie/Stephanie. She talks to him kind of disrespectfully, but it doesn't bother him. He treats her as an equal.

There were loose ends tied up from the first book that really needed tying. Even a cameo of sorts from Valkyrie's deceased uncle who left her his house and fortune. The sorcerer world grows bigger and more complicated in this book, and Valkyrie has cause to think about the life she's chosen as the descendant of Ancients who has decided to fight the good fight. She realizes how much time she's missing out with her family.

This book is just plain weird. If you don't like weird, pass it by. If you have strong opinions on what young people should read and that list includes violent books with sorcery, monsters and psychopathic characters who have no qualms about harming a 13-year-old girl, then you won't care for this. But if you like fun, weirdly humorous, quirky, sometimes scary, and sometimes creepy crawly books with not a small degree of wish fulfillment for tweens (and messages about empowerment for young girls), then you might like this.

I don't have a frame of reference for this book, since all I know about it is the really cheesy movie that came out many moons ago with Adrienne Barbeau. I did read an older Hellblazer, where Swamp Thing pops in at the end, but that's about it. Overall, this was pretty good, but the subject matter is pretty icky. I did like the concept of nature being sort of neutral when it comes to good and evil. While Alec has always felt an affinity towards plants, he doesn't look at the green kingdom as a soft, fluffy, harmless place. Instead, he is aware that plants can be in their own way predatory and vicious. It's an interesting thought, and I see the truth in it. Case in point, a Clover vine that almost smothered my Crepe Myrtle bush and caused it to be susceptible to fungus that nearly killed it. That vine might seem harmless, but it certainly wasn't. Let's not even talk about Kudzu. Anyway, I digress. In this storyline, nature is a balance between the Red and the Green. The Red is animal life and the Green is plant life. And then there is the Rot. The dark spirit of decay and destruction. Now that is a creepy idea. The fact that those who have this power (of the Rot) can find the tiny spot of necrosis in you and cause it to overtake and destroy your body, turn you into this horrible, shambling zombie who spreads this corruption. And the only thing that stands between the Rot taking over and destroying life is the champion picked by the Parliament of Trees. Too bad Alec Holland is a reluctant hero.

I liked the Romeo and Juliet type feel between Alec and Abigail, since they are seemingly on different sides. It appeals to the romantic in me. What turned me off was the ick factor with the Rot. This book has some very disturbing imagery. I think it's the healer and lover of life in me. I am repulsed by the idea of decay and rot, so this book hit me where I love. This is a visceral read. The imagery jumping off the page at you. the ending is a huge cliffhanger, so you pretty much have to keep reading it. I'll definitely follow the series, but not in a row. I need a breather.

It's a good read, but some scenes are not fun reading, so I'd give it a 3.5/5.0 stars.

This was a lot more coherent than the initial book, London Falling, but I don't think this book is very accessible to the average urban fantasy reader. There is still a heavy British vibe to the story, which is a good thing, for the most part. Cornell takes the reader and the characters to some dark, strange places in a London that is familiar but eerily paranormal.

Overall rating: 3.5/5.0 stars.

Reviewed for Bitten by Books. http://bittenbybooks.com.

I'm not sure I can say I like this. The subject matter is quite unpalatable, really. I do have this attraction to occult detective stories, and that's Hellblazer in a nutshell. Constantine is not what I'd call a good man. His compass is flawed, but in his own way, he does try to make things right or do the right thing, even if it's for selfish reasons. He considers himself neutral in the good versus evil war. However, his acts more often than not add to the good side of things. If not, I probably would write him off. The tragic thing about Constantine is that he has left a trail of destruction in his wake, people whose lives were destroyed or taken due in part to a connection to him. I think that this weighs on Constantine, but it doesn't seem to motivate him to change his crooked ways. I did like how he manages to manipulate demons who think they have the upper hand. I wouldn't ever recommend making deals with demons, mind you, but it's amusing that Constantine does and always pulls a fast one over them.

The artwork is vivid, but it doesn't really appeal to me (a lot of yucky imagery), although I like Constantine's looks. Sometimes he looks like Billy Idol, sometimes more like a young Sting. I can see how inspired Joss Whedon was in his crafting of Spike and Giles' characters. Spike has Constantine's punk, don't care leanings, and his use of British insults. Giles' youthful peccadilloes seem very much like Constantine's youthful dabblings in the occult.

I'll keep reading this series, but I think this is one I will have to take regular breaks in between. However, I'm enjoying getting Constantine's background, especially since I am loving Justice League Dark, and since NBC is having a Constatine series starting up this fall.