The Faceless Ones (Skulduggery Pleasant - book 3)

Product Information

Cool Car: Skulduggery's classic Bentley. Though at one point he's forced to swap it out for an absolutely terrible, bright green and yellow one. The magical community is at first portrayed as extremely small. Once the council had fallen and Ghastly was out of commission, Skulduggery is adamant that he, Valkyrie and Tanith are the only ones left to oppose Serpine. As the books progress, the world expands and a great many close allies are introduced (the Dead Men in particular), this seems quite strange in retrospect. Review at the Whitby Gazette". Whitbygazette.co.uk. Archived from the original on 21 August 2009 . Retrieved 18 November 2012.

Magic Is a Monster Magnet: The tunnels under Uncle Gordon's house are filled with various monstrosities attracted to magic and those that use it.The Faceless Ones, for the first three books. Insane, murderous gods bent on destroying reality for their capricious whims, their return was the subject of plots behind the first three books. They soon become Out of Focus after their appearance in, appropriately enough, The Faceless Ones. They return to relevancy in Phase 2 big time, however. From Bad to Worse: Last Stand of Dead Men. The moment Mantis's forces get trapped in the Keep is the last Hope Spot before everything goes progressively more and more to Hell. Relentlessly. YTF 2008". Staffordshire.gov.uk. Archived from the original on 14 October 2008 . Retrieved 18 November 2012.

In the Blood: The usual effects are notably averted. While Stephanie is descended from the Ancients, it mostly doesn't mean much as she still has difficulty in using magic and has to learn it slowly. At one point, her blood line actually works against her. Heel–Face Revolving Door: The White Cleaver. Justified, as he becomes the servant of whichever Necromancer is the strongest.

Examples from both series:

Ian Moore, the mugger in Death Bringer. He hurt Valkyrie almost as bad as Melancholia did and nearly killed her despite being a mere mortal. Vandermeer Craven is a far straighter example, trying to manipulate everything by using Melancholia St Clair as his Death Bringer only for her to turn against him due to her belief that she's above life and decide and therefore can decide who lives or dies. Toward the end of Last Stand of Dead Men Darquesse curses Ravel with excruciating pain for twenty-three hours out of every day. His body can't even adjust to it, as the pain will just increase. The Sanctuary staff can't do anything to help either. A lot of them don't really want to.