Just a heads up.
Oh and in other news, I’ve decided to aim for 100,000 words for NaNo this year, seeing as we’re a little over halfway through the month and I’m a little over halfway to that target. Seemed like a good thing to aim for. We’ll see how well that one goes too.
On with the penultimate chapter…
What Happens?
The Quagmires fill the Baudelaires in on all the things that have
happened to them since they were separated, this includes explaining how they
were able to send the couplets via the V.F.D. crows. The children are then
spotted by the villagers and chased through the town. They all end up heading
for Hector’s place to escape in the hot air balloon, but when they arrive
there’s no sign of Hector or his invention.
Thoughts as I read:
This chapter image gives us another shot of what a host of
villagers holding flaming torches might look like. It’s seven arms all holding a
torch, one of them even has a fashionably pinstriped sleeve. There’s not really
much else I can say about these so we’ll just move on with the next bit of the
story, shall we?
If you have reached this far in the story, you must stop
now.
Obviously, we’ll disregard Snicket’s advice. He reminds us of how
miserable things are about to get, if you thought things were depressing before
this, well hold onto your hats because it’s about to get worse. On the other
hand, if you’re feeling a bit miserable these books are the perfect thing to
read because compared to the Baudelaires, your life will just look peachy. Not
that I’m miserable right now, I’m happy, I’m on target for 100,000 words and I’m
watching the Dixie Chicks DVD Mr Click got me for my birthday while all my pets
sleep beside me, but I thought I’d just through it out there as a recommendation
if you’re feeling a bit low.
Violet suddenly realises that danger is approaching and is forced
to end the happy reunion. Klaus then chooses this moment to fill in the
Quagmires on the fact that Detective Dupin is really Count Olaf. The Quagmires
cut him off though, they already know this as well as everything that’s been
going on with the Baudelaires. This is convenient because it saves us from
another recap of what’s happened during the last two hundred pages.
When the Baudelaires were cleaning the fountain the Quagmires
could hear them, but they couldn’t make themselves heard in return. They’ve been
gathering information in their notebooks, even though they’re both soaked their
notebooks have stayed relatively dry. Perhaps they’ve got those notebooks made
out of stone like the one I got in Edinburgh Zoo the other week (apparently it’s
waterproof but I don’t really like to get it wet to test how waterproof it
really is).
This is when we learn that the real V.F.D. is not the Village of
Fowl Devotees at all. So their decision to come here was wrong entirely. They’re
still standing there talking, Duncan’s about to tell them about Jacques but the
Council of Elders has just spotted the massive hole the Baudelaires left in the
side of the jail. This is where I forgot for a moment that I’m reading The
Series of Unfortunate Events right now, not Harry Potter and the
Deathly Hallows (which I was reading a couple of hours ago) and I wonder
why they didn’t just Reparo the wall or something. Then I realise that
wouldn’t work in this book anyway.
It’s ironic that the town even has a rule about not escaping from
the jail. Who’d’ve thought it?!
The villagers also go on to notice that the Fowl Fountain looks
different now, so it’s assumed that the Baudelaires are just running riot in the
village with wanton acts of vandalism all over the place. Luckily the villagers
go off to find Detective Dupin and alert The Daily Punctilio leaving
the children safe for the time being.
Sunny sums it up well when she says “Cose” meaning that it was a
bit too close for her liking. They’ve only got one place to go now, they’ve got
to get to Hector and the hot air balloon, it’s about their only hope for escape.
Sunny says “Scylla!” meaning “It’s either the self-sustaining hot air mobile
home or being burned at the stake!” I feel it’s also worth pointing out here
that Scylla was also a monster in Greek mythology, I’m not entirely sure what
the connection is between this monster and a self-sustaining hot air mobile
home.
Having googled this I’ve discovered the idiom “between Scylla and
Charybdis” which is a bit like being “between a rock and a hard place”.
Wikipedia says it means “being between two dangers, choosing either of which
brings harm”. Well said Sunny. See how educational these books are!
As they head for Nevermore Tree Klaus brings up the question of
how they were able to deliver the couplets, which leads to the Quagmires telling
them everything that has happened since we saw them last. Basically they were
held for a while in the Baudelaires’ old bedroom at Olaf’s place, then Olaf got
the fountain built (he already seems to have inexhaustible wealth which does
make you wonder why he needs the Baudelaire fortune as well), and the Quagmires
were hidden inside.
The couplet riddle was Isadora’s idea and they managed to send
them to the Baudelaires each morning by wrapping a soggy couple round a bird’s
leg, knowing it would fall off when it came to roost at the end of the day.
Evidently it worked really well.
Then they bring up Jacques and we get a bit of a revelation that I
had completely forgotten. Jacques is actually Jacques Snicket. Ooh! I remember
reading this for the first time and getting really excited at this bit. When
Violet thinks his name is familiar Duncan is unsurprised, after all “Jacques
Snicket is the brother of a man who –” but who he is we never find out because
once again Duncan is interrupted as one of the villagers spots the children.
As the villagers rush towards them we hear them wondering who the
two additional children are. They don’t have a clue who the Quagmires are but
decide to burn them at the stake too since they’re probably more accomplices.
Plus they’re breathing so they’re probably breaking at least ten of the
village’s rules.
Once again Sunny is the one to get everyone to snap out of
terrified paralysis and says “Lililk!” which means “Let’s go! Don’t look behind
you! Let’s just try to get to Hector and his self-sustaining hot air mobile home
before the mob catches up with us and burns us at the stake!” I am rapidly
coming to the decision that Sunny is one of my favourite characters in the
series in this read through, she’s kind of the glue that holds everybody
together. And she stops them getting caught quite a lot of the time too!
So the kids run, with all the villages chasing after them:
Occasionally they had to retrace their steps, a phrase which
here means “turn around and run the other way when they saw townspeople
approaching”…
Eventually they make it back to Hector’s place and can’t see any
sign of Hector or the hot air balloon. So they start to panic a little bit.
Luckily Sunny is still with them so she says “Vireo!” which means “Let’s run –
or, in my case, crawl – as fast as we can!”. Violet points out that even running
and crawling they’re not going to be able to get away as the villagers are
closing in on them all now.
There’s a mention here of ‘an enormous root vegetable’ which I
didn’t immediately get the reference to until later in the paragraph. Earlier in
the book we heard about ‘small potatoes’ well the attack of the villagers is not
small potatoes at all. This is great big, giant scary potatoes.
And the Baudelaires are trapped.
And there’s no way out.
And that’s the end of the chapter so you’re going to have to wait
until Thursday to find out how it ends!
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