Once Again, With Grim Grotto, Snicket Really Satisfies You

As anyone who was stuck in Hurricane Katrina's path can attest, water has the potential to be deadly. But the aqueous troubles facing the Baudelaires in the thus-far final installment of the Series of Unfortunate Events have little to do with the weather - though Snicket goes to great lengths to make certain his readers understand the intricacies of the water cycle, less in an attempt to educate than to bore his audience to sleep if they are too stubborn to put down the book after his repeated warnings. At the outset of the book, the orphans are racing through the waters of a massive melted waterfall, but the remainder of the book takes place deep underwater - inside both a submarine and a mysterious cave known as the Gorgonian Grotto.

This book differs from previous chapters in several ways. Once the orphans descend from the icy current into the relative safety of a submarine occupied by VFD sympathizers, they remain in a peaceful for the next hundred pages or so. Yes, they're still evading a dangerous villain and searching for a valuable artifact that he desperately wants, but they are in the company of kindred spirits, folks who appreciate their talents and are able to offer them reasonably comfortable accommodations. On board are one surprisingly familiar chap and two strangers who nonetheless know just who the children are and what has happened to them. These new friends introduce themselves as Captain Widdershins, a loud, addled man bound by the personal philosophy "He (or she) who hesitates is lost" and overly fond of the word "aye," and his stepdaughter Fiona, a triangle-spectacled mycologist a bit older than Violet. Though there are more comforting locations to be in than a rickety submarine, the stretch of pages from the Baudelaires' entry onto the vessel to their departure in search of the all-important sugar bowl is possibly the most pleasant since their stay with Uncle Monty, even if their captain's hasty speech leads to some confusion.

When Olaf finally does show up, there is no attempt at a disguise; of course, he hasn't resorted to that tactic since the eighth book, but it's nonetheless a bit abrupt the way he appears and demands that the children join him on his own hi-jacked vessel. What's especially unusual is that when Olaf captured the underwater vehicle, he had no idea that the children were inside. At this point, the Baudelaires and their new friend Fiona - of whom Klaus is especially fond - have already encountered a deadly situation. One could perhaps call the perpetrator malicious, but most likely the venomous mushrooms that poisoned Sunny took no pleasure in the act. Nonetheless, this fungus poses a far more serious threat than the count, who is so taken with his new form of villainous laughter that he has little attention to devote to anything else.

Esme, meanwhile, is preoccupied with Carmelita Spats, the Baudelaires' dreadful classmate who conducts herself with all the charm of Veruca Salt. One would presume that, given her eagerness to deride orphans, Carmelita has parents of her own, but she seems perfectly content to be adopted by the villainous couple. Because Esme adores her and Olaf - whom Carmelita calls "Countie" - is badgered by her (to the point of reluctantly naming his submarine after her), she gets to do whatever her little heart desires, and under the influence of the violinist vice-principal at Prufrock Prep it seems her favorite pastime is performing recitals. Her dancing is abysmal, but her singing - usually an acrostic song she composed in which she insists that the "m" in her name stands for "gorgeous" - is akin to the sort of torture Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy describes in relation to Vogon poetry readings.

Speaking of poetry, more of the author's literary preferences shine through this volume. In the last book, we learned he was an admirer - nay, a friend - of poet Robert Frost. Here, we note his approval of the uniforms worn by Widdershins and his crew. They feature a portrait of Herman Melville, an appropriate source of inspiration for seafarers. Widdershins' admiration for the Moby Dick author - whose style Klaus describes as "strange" and "experimental" as well as humanitarian - is also apparent in his decision to name the vessel in homage of Queequeg, Ishmael's faithful crewmate. The children later encounter poetry by Louis Carroll - which Violet dismisses as "too whimsical" - and T. S. Eliot - which Klaus complains is "too opaque." In spite of these less than glowing opinions, however, Snicket asserts that anyone would agree these two poets are preferable to the man featured on the uniforms worn by Olaf and his crew. This name of this poor abused fellow, Edgar Guest, seemed familiar to me, but I had to do a bit of searching before I discovered just what it was he had written to make Snicket deride him as "a writer of limited skill, who wrote awkward tedious poetry on hopelessly sentimental topics." The problem? As I had slightly suspected would be the case, I rather liked the guy. I guess his is the sort of verse you might encounter on a Hallmark card. Certainly his generally family-oriented or inspirational poems don't seem the sort of which Olaf and his crew would approve, but apparently that was not sufficient reason to pass up an opportunity to pummel a prolific pedestrian poet.

When I read these books, I have taken to jotting down page numbers containing particularly interesting phrasing, and I believe I jotted down more numbers here than ever before. Snicket is at his snarky best, pulling out one mangled metaphor, bizarre illustration or pithy observation after another, all the while building upon the central conceit of the water cycle and demonstrating Sunny's ever-improving speech skills, which seem to indicate that she will be fluent in several languages. A few random examples of the author's genius:

* "Having a personal philosophy is like having a pet marmoset, because it may be very attractive when you acquire it, but there may be situations when it will not come in handy at all."

* "It is one of life's bitterest truths that bedtime so often arrives just when things are really getting interesting."

* "If you are stricken with a great sadness, you may feel as if you have been set aflame, not only because of the enormous pain, but also because your sadness may spread over your life, like smoke from an enormous fire. You might find it difficult to see anything but your own sadness, the way smoke can cover a landscape so that all anyone can see is black. You may find that happy things are tainted with sadness, the way smoke leaves its ashen colors and scents on everything it touches. And you may find that if someone pours water all over you, you are damp and distracted, but not cured of your sadness, the way a fire department can douse a fire but never recover what has been burnt down."

Ah, the poetry. As I gaze at the back cover of the book I have just finished, I notice Snicket's traditional warning, which this time cautions me to find a happier book "in order to keep [my] eyes and [my] spirits from being dampened." Alas, I did not listen, and I'm sitting here with my waterlogged soul, despairing in the knowledge that I have finished the series thus far and I cannot proceed immediately to the next installment. Oh, the calamity! But I will be shedding tears of a different sort than Snicket warns against when the enigmatic next book arrives. As the Baudelaires embark on the final stages of their grand adventure, I will be awash with joy and blessing this morose narrator for his perseverance.