Book Review: The Wide Window, A series of Unfortunate Events

The Wide Window, A series of Unfortunate Events: The crazy lives of three orphan kids.

Lemony Snicket
Gothic Fiction
( 1 of 7 books)

Rating: 4/10
Warning: This book is good if you are in elementary school, but if not it is pretty boring.

     Violet, Klaus and Sunny are siblings who recently lost their parents in a house fire. They are now orphans and not really sure where they are going in life. They have spent some time with their great Uncle, Count O'laf. He isn't the most loving uncle but he has shown some interest in taking care of these orphans. After living with him for a while they realized that he doesn't care about them and that they don't want a guardian who is going to treat them like that. So they contact Mr. Poe a close family friend and also a banker and see if there is any other family to stay with. They find their great Aunt Josephine. She lives in an old creepy house over looking a lake and curdled cave. The three kids are trying their hardest to stay away from Count O'laf but for some odd reason he keeps trying to get into their lives.

     The kids come home one day from the market and find that Aunt Josephine is no where to be found. They search the house for some time and then later find a note signed by Aunt Josephine. The kids read the letter but can't make much sense of it. Klaus being the smart one thinks to look closer into the letter and see if there could possibly be anything hidden inside the letter. As they are examining it Klaus figures it out. They get the impression to go look in "Curdled Cave." So the three children set off in a little sail boat in search of there guardian. They make it to Curdled Cave and her these petrified screams they keep rowing and look into the distant realizing that they have found their Aunt Josephine. They get her into the sail boat and start rowing back to shore, to their surprise here comes a man in a motor boat he looks and sounds a lot like Count O'laf. He offers to take the kids back to the shore and of course Aunt Josephine agrees because she is not in her right mind. Are the kids with O'laf again or is this just a friendly citizen trying to help out the community.

Lemony Snicket is a great writer. His books always leave you with a question and wanting more. He is good at going into detail, I think he does that because he wants you to feel like you could put yourself in as one of the characters and feel like you are in the book. He also does a really good job at keeping you interested, although I didn't enjoy the book as much as I thought I would he kept the story going and it never felt like it kept dragging, he didn't spend too much time on one subject.

I would recommend this book to anyone who likes a book that leaves you questions. I would also recommend it to a younger age, like elementary school. It is a pretty easy read and easy to get into, if you enjoy a little mystery in your books.