Book Review: "The Wide Window (A Series of Unfortunate Events, Book 3)" by Lemony Snicket

I'm continuing in my quest to read all 13 books in this delightful series. (Okay, I mean delightful in the sense that it makes for some entertaining reading, by no means do I mean that the poor Baudelaire orphans have delightful adventures.) Mr. Lemony Snicket (a.k.a. Daniel Handler) has just released book 13 "The End." From my recent interest in the books I'm saddened that I didn't start reading them earlier. But then again, I can now read all 13 without interruption.

The books were originally purchased for my kids and when I saw that they were as engrossed in them as they were with the Harry Potter books, I had to try them...about 6 years too late.

In this contribution to the series we find the Baudelaire orphans being sent to their Aunt Josephine, okay once again not a direct relative but their second cousin's sister-in-law, but the closest to family they have. Aunt Josephine is a great character, she's afraid of everything, including realtor's, and is a perfectionist when it comes to grammar. She has a whole library full of grammar rule books and in that same library is the "wide window" looking out on Lake Lachrymose.

Once again Count Olaf returns to take the Baudelaire fortune, this time under the guise of Captain Sham, whose business card proclaims him to be proprietor of Captain Sham's Sailboat Rentals. He flirts with Aunt Josephine enough to get through her shell and later convinces her to commit suicide and leave the children to him. Now as you may remember Count Olaf has already tried different ways to get the fortune, one by adopting them, one by trying to marry Violet (the oldest) and then by murdering Uncle Monty and threatening to take the kids to Peru.

Once again, Lemony Snicket does not allow the reader a happy ending. It always ends bad for the orphans, but the creativity in the writing and the fun characters make this book a great read. And like I say any book that gets "kids" of all ages reading it's worth checking into.

This book cemented my fandom. I was on the fence before but now, I'm a Lemony Snicket Fan.