A Series of Unfortunate Events 7 and 8 by Lemony Snicket
News today: not much. I listened to a lot of music, read a bit of Eye of the World... Haven't actually written some of my book yet, that's not good, because falling behind on National Novel Writing Month is hard to come back from... But my taekwondo test was awesome. Pretty guaranteed I passed, so I'm happy.
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots: 10
Grand Theft Auto IV: 10
LittleBigPlanet: 9.5
BioShock: 9.5
Uncharted 2: Among Thieves: 9.5
inFamous: 9.0
Killzone 2: 9.0
Uncharted: Drake's Fortune: 9.0
Dead Space: 9.0
Resident Evil 5: 8.5
Valkyria Chronicles: 8.5
Resistance: Fall of Man: 8.5
Resistance 2: 9.0
Batman: Arkham Asylum: 9.0
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone by J.K. Rowling: 9.0
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling: 9.0
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling: 10
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J.K. Rowling: 9.5
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J.K. Rowling: 9.5
The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien: 8.5
The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien: 9.0
The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers by J.R.R. Tolkien: 10
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King by J.R.R. Tolkien: 10
Eragon by Christopher Paolini: 8.5
Eldest by Christopher Paolini: 9.0
Brisingr by Christopher Paolini: 9.0
The Dark Tower I: The Gunslinger by Stephen King: 8.0
The Dark Tower II: The Drawing of the Three by Stephen King: 9.5
The Dark Tower III: The Waste Lands by Stephen King: 9.5
The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman: 9.0
The Subtle Knife by Philip Pullman: 9.5
The Amber Spyglass by Philip Pullman: 10
Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer: 8.5
Artemis Fowl: The Arctic Incident by Eoin Colfer: 8.0
Artemis Fowl: The Eternity Code by Eoin Colfer: 9.0
Artemis Fowl: The Opal Deception by Eoin Colfer: 8.5
A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Bad Beginning by Lemony Snicket: 7.0
A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Reptile Room by Lemony Snicket: 7.5
A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Wide Window by Lemony Snicket: 7.5
A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Miserable Mill by Lemony Snicket: 7.0
A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Austere Academy by Lemony Snicket: 8.0
A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Ersatz Elevator by Lemony Snicket: 8.5
The Amulet of Samarkand by Jonathan Stroud: 9.0
The Golem's Eye by Jonathan Stroud: 8.5
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Magician's Nephew: 7.5
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe: 9.0
A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Vile Village and The Hostile Hospital by Lemony Snicket
With my previous reviews of A Series of Unfortunate Events, I've said that for the most part, the series is improving as it goes along. It started with a couple slightly-repetitive books about Violet, Klaus, and Sunny Baudelaire, whose parents die in a fire in book one. They are taken to live with their greedy almost-relative Count Olaf, who tries to steal the fortune they're going to inherit when the eldest, Violet, turns eighteen (she's fourteen). Once they convince the idiotic Mr. Poe,the banker taking care of the fortune and the guy deciding where they live, that Olaf is bad, he starts shunting them around to different guardians. However, Olaf follows them to all of their new homes and continually tries to steal the fortune from them (he's pretty determined). This goes on for the first four books, which I basically graded by where the Baudelaires live and the new characters that enter into the series.
With five and six though, we start to see the beginnings of a plot tying everything together (including the first few), when some new friends of the Baudelaires, Duncan and Isadora Quagmire, discover a mysterious organization called VFD. We slowly learn more about this organization (which has actually been popping up all over the place) from then on, and this is when the books really pick up speed.
As you can tell by my reviews, I think outside of book four, the series has been improving, with the first four being very good and five and six being excellent. For seven and eight I wouldn't say Lemony Snicket improved a lot from the last two, but he definitely didn't lose any speed, either.
Book seven, The Vile Village, takes off the same way the first six did, with the Baudelaires being sent off to live with a new guardian. In this case, though, an entire village (the titular vile one named the Village of Fowl Devotees, VFD, which immediately catches the Baudelaires' attention) is raising them, because Snicket decided to incorporate the "It takes a village to raise a child" saying into his book.
And of course, with another home comes another disguise ofCount Olaf's he plans touse to get the Baudelaire fortune. Yes, there are some repetitive elements here too (the Baudelaires meet up with the Quagmiresand fail to learn about thereal VFD, not the village, yet again), butin this one,all hell breaks loose. By the end, the Baudelaires have been accused of murder,thrown in jail, chased by an angry mob, and the ending turns out more unfortunate than ever before.
That lastin particular is something I really liked about this one, because it shows that in future, we're going to be getting a lot less repetition, although Village does a decent job of that itself. Itdoes use some of the same elements of the previous books, butit mixes things up more than any of its predecessors with the village idea itself, a very uniquestoryline, a violent cast, the guy they actually live with (Hector, a hot air balloon fanatic) being almost helpful, and a very well-executed mystery sequence where the Baudelaires try to figure out clues being sent to them by the Quagmires.
As Snicket's storytelling gets more complex, the characters are developed better,andthe authorgets a better handle on his own writing,the series has improved a lot, this book being no exception.This one's longer, deeper, and, because itstarts gettingmore original,more interesting thanits predecessors.Despite some familiar territory the series has set up for itself, Vile Village takes a bunch of new, darker directions that are more intriguing than what have been seen before in the series, and makes it the best of the first seven.
Book eight, The Hostile Hospital, is another excellent entry in the series. Snicket's writing has now gotten to its peak (which it stays at for the rest of the series), so the storytelling in this one is just as brilliant as in book seven. It's nearly as long as seven, equally deep, and very thrilling, because it utilizes seven's surprise ending very well and cuts down even more on the repetition, which Snicket probably realized would've gotten old by book eight.
Also like seven, there's much more action to be found here than in the first few books, which focused on how unfortunate the Baudelaire's situations were and not as much on the Baudelaires fighting to get away from them. Of course, this is partially because the kids are now convicted felons, but there's also a lot of violence in the hospital they end up staying at for awhile of their own choosing, since Mr. Poe doesn't even appear in this one. You'll get deaths, attempted murders, even more mystery swirling about VFD than ever before, and, most excitingly of all, evidence that someone may have survived the fire at the Baudelaire mansion.
However, I will say that I thought eight in terms of excitement and intrigue wasn't quite up to snuff with six and seven before it. While I praise it highly for breaking the mold (it has yet another excellent cliffhanger ending) and getting into the overall story more than its predecessors, once the Baudelaires get to the hospital, Snicket starts doing a few things that take a bit too long or repeat themselves too much toward the middle. We get a whole bunch of the kids studying anagrams and filing papers thrown at us, neither of which enthuse me. So while there are scenes that are some of the best in the series (the ending, the action sequences, the sections about the Baudelaire fire, the mysterious Snicket file, and the new VFD information), there are also some rather drab ones.
Overall, my favorite to least favorite of the series so far are as follows: 7, 6, 8, 5, 3, 2, 1, 4, meaning the ones I just reviewed were fantastic entries. Seven still had some repetitive moments but was the first one to start changing things and never had a dull moment, while eight had some of the most original, fresh scenes but also had a few dull ones. But these show, on the whole,that there are fantastic things to come in the series. Nicely done, Mr. Snicket.
The Vile Village: 8.5
The Hostile Hospital: 8.5
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Can't remember why, but it did. The twist (I think it has something to do with birds or something) blew my mind.
@Bambii12633: You know it! The Wheel of Time (what I'm reading now) is ridiculous even by my standards though.
@luc11044: The movie was the first three books put in a blender, with half of book one at the beginning and half of it at the end. It had the general story in there with the three guardians for those books and decent acting, but Jim Carrey, as much as I love him, is not Count Olaf, because Count Olaf is pure evil. He says some funny stuff sometimes, but that's because it's so over-the-top violent for a children's series.
The movie was all lighthearted and funny. The books are very dark and grim. They have plenty of humor, but it's mostly dark humor, not Jim Carrey making weird faces, and they added in a few things that were pretty weak. They did hit many of the plot points (enough to have made a sequel), and I didn't hate it or anything, but what really messed it up was that it completely missed the tone. It would've been great if it had stuck to the darkness and chronology of the books.
As a sidenote, maybe it's because I was five years younger, but I actually thought the game was pretty good.
@hazelnutman: *spoilers* The birds kept delivering messages to the Baudelaires from the Quagmires that were clues to where they were being hidden by Olaf (in a fountain, which is a bit bothersome). I wasn't disturbed by the book, but if you really think about the subject matter it is pretty morbid, even by Unfortunate Events standards, which is part of why I liked it.
There were a couple surprise moments in there, but the twist I think of is the ending I mentioned above where the Baudelaires go on the run, so for the rest of the series we don't see them being brought to another guardian by Mr. Poe anymore. That alone made the second half of the series much better than the first half to me, because Mr. Poe is stupid. *end spoilers*
I did a book report on book 7 in fifth grade. I made an awesome diorama to go with it.
I liked the themes and the dark turn in book 7. The murder incident was a great part of the book, and a great moment in the series.
And thank you for posting pictures, becuase it reminded me how much I love this series' cover art. I own all of them with the hardcover style. The art is great. That's how I came to view the characters.
Then the movie ruined my thoughts. Not only was it a bad interpretation, but I didn't think the characters (children mainly) looked right.
@itsTolkien_time: I'll make posting the pictures a consistent thing.
It ticked me off that Klaus didn't wear glasses... like ever! I didn't mind that they were a bit off, and I thought the movie was decent, but definitely not worthy of the books. And yes, Brett Helquist rocks.
I just love the art. Look at the cover of book 8. The hook handed man and his latex glove, the differences in the expressions of Klaus and the villains, the excellent shading and color-tone. They are just entrancing. And the hardcover backs and pages are of good quality also.
I agree. And the chapter pictures were great too. I really liked the cover of book 12 (as well as the book itself) because there was so much going on.
And what music do you listen too? You mention music (and guitar!) in your blogs.
I got my green belt today!
And punk, rock, alternative ftw! Rise Against, Bad Religion, Green Day, Linkin Park, Third Eye Blind, The Fray, Lifehouse, AC/DC... lots of things.
Congrats on the belt.
Those are some good genres and bands. I listen to some of them. I'm more of a classic rock person. I listed some of my favorites in a blog a little ways back. The only genres I really dislike are Country, Rap, most Death Metal, Screamo, and most pop. I can't stand the Lady Gaga etc. junk that tops the charts now.
Thanks.
Those genres do indeed suck. There's some pop mixed with other genres that's okay to me, but country, rap, hardcore screamo death metal, all garbage...
Must be a slow year for entertainment.
Hope you review another book soon.