The Slippery Slope Review
The Slippery Slope Review
(Series of Unfortunate Events Book 10)
Author: Lemony Snicket
Year: 2003
In book ten of the series of unfortunate events, one of the three protagonists is in the clutches of the villain Count Olaf, and her siblings are trying to find here while on top of trying to survive. The newest location is mountain peeks, and the scenery although not as characterized as usual, works for the theme. Although at book ten out of thirteen, you still are left in the dark about the many secrets of the Baudelaires, and if any are given more and more. Like promised you are given some, like the location of the one who survived the fire. And of course that brings more and more mystery into play. There are some returning faces that I won’t spoil, and to be honest that was very cool. Until this point not many characters returned, and unfortunately the two that do return aren’t exactly good characters, making the list of enemies go up. On top of that there are two new villains, and they’re kind of boring, but they work and you feel they’ll make a big impact eventually. Although as a whole this book is really good, I feel it was one step back for the series. There was the typical big moments, and it worked, but I was expecting a bit more. This took a really long time for me to finish because I was really uninterested. All it really has are those mystery and suspense scenes that worked the first time I read it, but didn’t hold up this time. I feel it’s the second book in the series so far, but ever since the fifth book it got better and better, so I was disappointed this one was a little worse than book nine in my opinion. I actually thought it was a little worse than the eighth book while reading, but it all came together in the last chapter and caught up. That being said some of the pacing and writing I felt choppy. I know Lemony Snicket has thirteen chapters for the thirteen books, but I don’t think he should limit himself for the purpose of fitting everything into thirteen chapters. This book felt short and long, which didn’t feel right to me. Also a huge theme of this one is the three orphans possibly becoming villains because they are fighting fire with fire. But in the end the moral is fighting fire with fire is a terrible idea, and when looking at it, it’s makes for a good moral and theme. At one point Violet kind of just says the whole moral straight up, and I don’t think people should just say completely say what the moral is, but it works in this I suppose, and it made sense. But I will say this book is probably the most suspenseful one yet. In the last one you were worried about them being caught at all times, now your worried they’ll get caught and die at all times. In the end I do feel it’s a little bit of a step back, but it’s still a great edition to the series, and makes in the top five.
The Slippery Slope gets a 4/5
Spoilers: Of all the characters I really didn’t want to welcome back, Carmelita was at the top, so of course she returned. Also Bruce turned out to be the guy from the end of book two, and I hadn’t remembered that at all while reading this, so that was a nice surprise. And the one who escaped the fire was revealed, and it was not the Baudelaire parents, it was Quigley Quagmire, the triplet believed to have died in the fire. I wouldn’t say this was a let down, as it was a cool surprise I hadn’t expected while reading, but come on! Just give us something you promised! Okay, he did but… you get my point. Also the white faced women are no more. They kind of just walked off, the end. They didn’t die, they just walked away. This is one of the parts I felt was choppy cause that could have been better. It kind of added to the theme of this book fighting fire with fire isn’t really a good thing, and you’ll destroy your own things by doing it.
Badges
The Slippery Slope gets THE CHARACTER BADGE
The Slippery Slope gets The "CREATIVITY" BADGE
