I enjoyed Book the Sixth, please. Violet, Klaus and Sunny Baudelaire have been sent to live with Jerome and Esmé Squalor in their huge penthouse apartment on Dark Avenue, not far from where they lived with their parents before the devastating fire that started this entire series of unfortunate events. But of course, things are still pretty bleak when it turns out Esmé is only concerned with what is in and Jerome "doesn't like to argue." Even worse, the two Quagmire triplets are still in Count Olaf's clutches, and no one seems to care about helping them but the Baudelaires. Once again, the resourceful orphans must take matters into their own hands and discover the secret of the ersatz elevator and continue to search for the Quagmires and solve the mystery of V.F.D.

It's not my favorite, but there is a lot to like about this book, and actually quite a lot to take in. There are at least three moments where I gasp aloud still. This is also the first of the red herrings about V.F.D., which really threw me off the first time I read this, but it adds to the mystery and overall story. It's interesting to see Lemony Snicket slowly being introduced more as an active part of the world in the books, and it's fun to start to piece together his involvement with the Baudelaires' history. Esmé is already maddening, and Jerome is almost even worse, though he's basically the token "kind" adult in this one. There are a few times when the author stretches things a little to move his plot along, even for "Lemony Snicket," but you just go along for the ride and enjoy it anyway.

This one is good and funny and even a little bit genuinely sad. Also, although Lemony Snicket's literary device of using very situation-specific definitions is usually employed for humor, this book did teach me what the word "ersatz" means, which is great.