Book Review - Jonathan Stroud's The Creeping Shadow
Published by: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Publication Date: September 13th, 2016
Format: Paperback, 435 Pages
Rating: ★★★★
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After the events at Aickmere's Department Store Lucy has left Lockwood and Co. She and the skull have gone freelance. Which has it's ups and downs. Her home isn't really a home and she misses 35 Portland Row and Lockwood in particular but she's not about to go crawling back begging for her old job. One day, after a long night, there he is, Anthony Lockwood, at her door. She knew they'd eventually see each other but she didn't think he'd seek her out. He's not asking her to come back just asking for her help. Penelope Fittes has asked the Lockwood and Co. complement to look into the case of Solomon Guppy, otherwise known as the Brixton Cannibal. He killed and ate his victims and it seems his ghost has returned to his old home. The source must be found and destroyed. Lockwood and Co. with Lucy and Quill Kipps in tow successfully find the source but Lockwood is reckless and Lucy is worried. She left in order to protect him and it seems that this has had the opposite effect. Though with the life Lucy leads she doesn't have time to dwell on this revelation as the very next day the skull is stolen from her apartment. There's only one person who knew about the skull other than her friends and that's a worker at the Fittes Furnaces where sources are destroyed. Lucy reaches out to him but it doesn't end well, he's murdered and she's on the run. The only place she can go is Portland Row. After a failed attempt to rescue the skull they decide that perhaps being in London isn't that safe at the moment and they accept a job they had previously turned down. The village of Aldbury Castle is swarming with spirits. What's more, Aldbury Castle is near a research facility run by the Rotwell Agency who it appears has been behind the purchase of artifacts that should have been thrown in the furnace. What they find inside the facility will change the very underpinnings of how society views The Problem. Their problem is staying alive long enough to let the world know.
While this series has always had Lucy at it's heart, with her moving out on her own she becomes even more important. This isn't about Lockwood and Co. anymore, this is about Lucy's relationship to Lockwood and Co. It's an interesting shift. Because partly it's like the first book with Lucy being the outsider, but at the same time we've spent three books with her building a relationship with Anthony and George and we have insider knowledge. It's an interesting liminal space to be in and ties in perfectly with the reveal at the end. Because Fittes and Rotwell, instead of actually fighting The Problem, they have been creating it by using sources to power a portal to the Other Side, which itself is a liminal space between life and death. This grey and lifeless mirror world isn't meant for the living and their intrusion is causing chaos. There is no balance between life and death anymore. The natural order of things has been damaged, perhaps beyond repair. This is the heart of the matter, humans mucking about can make everything worse. And unlike Penelope Fittes, Lucy, Anthony, and George, don't strive for power they strive for survival and normalcy. That's what these kids have all been fighting for, a world in which they can be kids. Though of course I would love to follow them forever and see there adventures as adults, I know there's only one book left to wrap it all up. Which I'm sad and also grateful for. Because while I love this world there are some quirks of Stroud's that really get on my nerves. Yes, I'm back to his body shaming yet again. Here it reaches a new level of unacceptable with the cannibal and his capacious corpse leaving belly streaks on the walls of his home. Firstly, how many people was Solomon Guppy eating? Because it sounds more of the gorging than of the eating to survive variety of killing. But more importantly, just no. I do not want to read about an obese Jeffrey Dahmer thank you very much. Really though, the belly streaks on the wall were the tipping point for me. Just so much no.
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