The audiobook is fantastic! Fun and quirky, as always, with music and read by Tim Curry! ( )

4/5

I don't really get why people have such a problem with this book, according to the reviews I've seen so far. It has most of the things I enjoy in a good book in this series: the orphans have a good amount of choice and act for their own sake, not just moving through the motions, elements that would otherwise be kinda stale are shaken up quite a bit and even their guardians have changed somewhat. Maybe I'm more resistant to these things because I give a good space between the books and each one sounds refreshing.
The creativity of the prose is one of the best things in these books and this one is no exception. Quick, witty and fun, I always enjoy a good Lemony Snicket story.
My spoiler section will be much longer for this book because almost everything I want to say about it qualifies as a spoiler. The fact that this time one of their guardians actually was working for Olaf all along is very interesting and not something I expected. Esmé is a great character is her simple and deep greed, despite being vastly wealthy already, this becomes clear very quickly: she always wants more. Also makes Olaf more dangerous, he doesn't just show up and trick people, he actually has friends in various places.
Some sillier parts are once again back in evidence, but I didn't mind much. Sunny climbing the building with her teeth was the weirdest, but I didn't mind it THAT much.
The overall plot also has started to move more and it gives a very good sense of progress. The mystery of what those letters mean, why the tunnel leads to their burned mansion, the fate of the twins, just to name a few. Even the author himself, or rather his character, starts to connect to the story, we had someone inside the story mention Beatrice, who was previously only talked about by Snicket himself.
And my favorite point: Jerome. In my humble opinion, by the end of the book the character actually felt like a very clear parody of a certain type of people. Throughout the whole book we are led to believe that he just hates arguing to an extreme point and serves as a counterpart to his wife's greed and evil. But it's not that, it's much more simple: he just doesn't care. When faced with the children's appeal to help their friends, he doesn't even insist on helping them, he just leaves and doesn't look back. It's not that he didn't realize that Esmé was evil, he just didn't care, it didn't affect him. Why would he bother arguing? At the end of the day, he was the worst guardian they had so far, aside from Olaf himself, just a man that didn't care about anything or anyone, for better or for worse. The children could've died and I don't think he would even stop to think about it much.
All in all, a very fun addition to the series and one that I deeply enjoyed and made me hyped for the next book. Now, I'm sure I've said this before, but I really do wish I had read these books when I was younger, it would've probably changed my relationship with literature. ( )

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The three Baudelaire orphans have been set up with a new guardian and move to their home in a neighborhood that has the most domineering homeowners' association ever. Rules about what is and isn't allowed change on a regular basis, but the Baudelaires are more concerned about what happened to their friends, who were abducted in the previous book.

I feel like my reviews for this series are beginning to become redundant. But to be fair, that's because the books are redundant. Well, maybe that's not entirely true, since a few things did happen in this book that broke away from the formula a little. But it's just too little to make me suddenly start liking it. Especially given some of the absurd elements of this book, like Sunny climbing up an elevator shaft with her teeth and everything having to do with the red-hot tongs.

Any time I wonder why I keep listening to the series when I've disliked it so much so far, I only have to remember Tim Curry doing a purposely bad Swedish accent. It was the best part of the whole book for me, and half a star of my rating is based on his narration. However, even he may not be able to get me to continue this series, if it doesn't get less ridiculous soon. ( )

In their most daring misadventure, the Baudelaire orphans are adopted by very, very rich people, whose penthouse apartment is located mysteriously close to the place where all their misfortune began. Even though their new home in the city is fancy, and the children are clever and charming, I'm sorry to say that still, the unlucky orphans will encounter more disaster and woe.

In fact, in this sixth book in A Series of Unfortunate Events, the children will experience a darkened staircase, a red herring, an auction, parsley soda, some friends in a dire situation, a secret passageway, and pinstripe suits.