The Slippery Slope (A Series of Unfortunate Events, Book 10)
Common Sense Note
Few books are seen as differently by adults and children as this series (A Series of Unfortunate Events). You'll probably enjoy it almost as much as your children -- but for entirely different reasons.
Common Sense Review
Reviewed By: Matt Berman
Children read this story, like its nine predecessors, as a rip-roaring adventure story. The author has a seemingly inexhaustible ability to come up with unusual and creative dangers and adventures to put the siblings through and, as Saturday morning serials showed a generation ago, children have an inexhaustible appetite for thrills and melodrama. This entry in the series is a bit longer than most of the others, and has more exposition and less action than some, but the author keeps it rolling along well enough to keep most young readers turning the pages.
For adults, this is witty and literary tongue-in-cheek silliness. Few children will get the allusions, such as Count Olaf's girlfriend, named after a book by J. D. Salinger, or the author's hilarious explanation of a famous Robert Frost poem: "The poet found that the road less traveled was peaceful but quite lonely, and he was probably a bit nervous as he went along, because if anything happened on the road less traveled, the other travelers would be on the road more frequently traveled and so couldn't hear him as he cried for help. Sure enough, that poet is now dead."
Both children and adults can appreciate the production values of the series. The hardcover editions hardly cost more than paperbacks, and with their rough-cut pages, endpapers, and well-matched illustrations, they are pleasurable physical objects as well as enjoyable stories.
From the Book
Violet opened her mouth to answer, but at that moment another question immediately occupied the minds of the elder Baudelaires. It is a dreadful question, and nearly everyone who has found themselves asking it has ended up wishing that they'd never brought up the subject. ... The question is, "What in the world is that ominous-looking cloud of tiny, white buzzing objects coming towards us?" and I'm sorry to tell you that the answer is "A swarm of well-organized, ill-tempered insects known as snow gnats, who live in cold mountain areas and enjoy stinging people for no reason whatsoever."
Plot Summary:
When last we saw our intrepid heroes, Sunny had been kidnapped by the dastardly Count Olaf, and Violet and Klaus were careening down a mountainside in a carnival caravan toward certain doom, a phrase which here means "a hair-raising last-minute escape depending on either Violet's talent for invention or Klaus's talent for research, or Sunny's talent for biting, or all three."
After making a drag chute out of a hammock and brakes out of sticky kitchen condiments, they set out to rescue Sunny. Along with the usual terrifying dangers and death-defying adventures, they encounter someone they thought was dead, someone else they would rather not have seen again, and snow gnats. More of their parents' history is revealed, Count Olaf meets up with some evil allies, and Sunny is growing up.
Related Books:
Other Books by Lemony Snicket
The Bad Beginning
The Reptile Room
The Wide Window
The Miserable Mill
The Austere Academy
The Ersatz Elevator
The Vile Village
The Hostile Hospital
The Carnivorous Carnival
Lemony Snicket: The Unauthorized Autobiography
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ViolencePlenty of intended and threatened violence, none actually carried out. Lots of children in danger here, but all done tongue in cheek, though not all readers will get that. |
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Drug/Alcohol/TobaccoEsme smokes. |
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