The Vile Village

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The Vile Village
Vile village.jpg
Author Lemony Snicket
Illustrator Brett Helquist
Cover artistBrett Helquist
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Series A Series of Unfortunate Events
Genre Gothic fiction
Absurdist fiction
Mystery
Publisher HarperCollins
Publication date
May 2001
Media typePrint (hardback & paperback)
Pages256
ISBN 978-0-06-440865-3
Preceded by The Ersatz Elevator  
Followed by The Hostile Hospital  

Book the Seventh: The Vile Village is the seventh novel in the children's book series A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket.

Contents

In The Vile Village, the Baudelaire orphans are taken into the care of a whole village, only to find many rules and chores, evil seniors, as well as Count Olaf and his evil girlfriend lurking nearby.

This book marks a turning point in the structure of the series and effectively marks the halfway mark between books one to six and eight to thirteen. It breaks with the following major patterns of the earlier books in the series:

Plot

Mr. Poe receives a brochure about a program where villages have signed up to communally raise children—the Baudelaires choose the village V.F.D., an abbreviation which the Quagmire children communicated to them while being kidnapped at the end of The Austere Academy . The village has a large number of unusual rules, created by the Council of Elders: their newest rule, outlawing villains, is meant to keep out Count Olaf. The children will live with the village's handyman, Hector. He tells them that the initials stand for the Village of Fowl Devotees—in reference to the large number of crows which follow very specific roosting patterns. At sunset they fly to Nevermore Tree, outside Hector's house.

Hector shows the children a couplet he found underneath Nevermore Tree, which resembles Isadora Quagmire's style of poetry. The children stay awake to see if any more messages arrive, and discover a second couplet the next morning. Along with Hector, they do chores for individual townspeople. After cleaning the crow-shaped Fowl Fountain, a council member tells them that Count Olaf has been captured by the new Chief of Police, Officer Luciana. Though the imprisoned man has a unibrow and a tattoo of an eye on his left ankle, he is not Count Olaf. He says that his name is Jacques. Nonetheless, the villagers plan to burn him at the stake—the punishment for breaking one of the town's rules.

Violet helps Hector with last-minute fixes to an invention he has been working on, against the rules of the town: a self-sustaining hot air mobile home so that he can fly away from the town and live up in the air. The next morning, after the children find another couplet, Count Olaf has arrived, disguised as Detective Dupin, and Jacques is dead. Olaf frames the children, who are jailed and will be burned at the stake the next day. He plans to smuggle one of them away to steal their fortune.

The children are given bread and a pitcher of water, as Klaus realizes that it is his thirteenth birthday. At Violet's instruction, the children spend the night repeatedly pouring the water down a wooden bench onto the jail cell wall, before reabsorbing it with the spongy bread. This slowly dissolves the mortar between the bricks in the wall, until a hole can be made by using the bench as a battering ram. They escape, after Hector passes them a fourth couplet through their cell window. Meanwhile, Klaus discovers that the first letter of each line in the couplets, read in order, spells "fountain".

The children work out that the Quagmires must be hidden in the beak of Fowl Fountain. Sunny stands on Klaus's shoulders as he stands on Violet's shoulders. Violet and Klaus fall and as Sunny is slipping off the fountain, she sinks her teeth into a crow eye that opens the fountain's beak. With the Quagmire children, the Baudelaires flee the villagers, who have formed an angry mob. As they run, the Quagmires explained that from inside the fountain, they could attach a message to a crow by morning who would take it to Nevermore Tree, where it would fall off.

When Hector is directly overhead, on the functioning self-sustained hot air mobile home, he sends down the ladder. As the home continually rises, the Quagmire children climb, followed by the Baudelaires. With a harpoon gun, Luciana aims for the balloons to make the home fall to the ground. Once the Quagmires are in the home, she hits the ladder instead, and the Baudelaires have to climb down to the ground to avoid falling to their deaths. The Quagmires throw down their commonplace notebooks, but Luciana succeeds in skewering both of them with a harpoon.

However, Luciana also injures a crow with the harpoon, causing the villagers to turn on her. She reveals herself as Esmé Squalor, now Olaf's girlfriend, and escapes with him by motorcycle. The villagers leave to take care of the crow and the Baudelaires collect the damaged fragments of the Quagmire's notebooks. Sunny takes her first steps unaided as the children leave the town on foot.

Foreshadowing

The last picture of The Vile Village shows Klaus in the foreground, trying to pick up the scraps of the Quagmires' commonplace books, and Violet and Sunny in the background, being blown about by the wind, about to walk into the horizon of emptiness. A copy of The Daily Punctilio appears in the scene, with an ad for the Last Chance General Store, a clear reference to The Hostile Hospital .

Cultural references and literary allusions

Translations

Adaptation

The book was adapted into the fifth and sixth episodes of the second season of the television series adaptation produced by Netflix. [1]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lemony Snicket</span> Pen name and fictional character

Lemony Snicket is the pen name of American author Daniel Handler. Handler has published several children's books under the name, most notably A Series of Unfortunate Events, which has sold over 60 million copies and spawned a 2004 film and TV series from 2017 to 2019. Lemony Snicket also serves as the in-universe author who investigates and re-tells the story of the Baudelaire orphans in A Series of Unfortunate Events.

<i>A Series of Unfortunate Events</i> Book series by Lemony Snicket

A Series of Unfortunate Events is a series of thirteen children's novels written by American author Daniel Handler under the pen name Lemony Snicket. The books follow the turbulent lives of orphaned siblings Violet, Klaus, and Sunny Baudelaire. After their parents' death in a fire, the children are placed in the custody of a murderous villain, Count Olaf, who attempts to steal their inheritance and causes numerous disasters with the help of his accomplices as the children attempt to flee. As the plot progresses, the Baudelaires gradually confront further mysteries surrounding their family and deep conspiracies involving a secret society, which also involves Olaf and Snicket, who is also a fictional character who narrated the books series as his investigating documentation about the Beaudelaires's whereabouts, in honor of his late ex-fiancé Beatrice, who is revealed to be the Beaudelaires's late mother.

<i>The Bad Beginning</i> 1999 childrens novel

Book the First: The Bad Beginning is the first novel of the children's novel series A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket. The novel tells the story of three children, Violet, Klaus, and Sunny Baudelaire, who become orphans following a fire and are sent to live with Count Olaf, who attempts to steal their inheritance.

<i>The Reptile Room</i> 1999 childrens novel

Book the Second: The Reptile Room is the second book in the children's series A Series of Unfortunate Events, written by Daniel Handler under the pseudonym Lemony Snicket. The book tells the story of the Baudelaire orphans, as they are sent to live with a distant relative named Montgomery Montgomery.

<i>The Wide Window</i> 2000 childrens novel

Book the Third: The Wide Window is the third novel of the children's book series A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket. In this novel, the Baudelaire orphans live with their aunt Josephine, who is seemingly scared of everything. The book was published on February 25, 2000 by HarperCollins and illustrated by Brett Helquist.

<i>The Miserable Mill</i> 2000 childrens novel

Book the Fourth: The Miserable Mill is the fourth novel of the children's novel series A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket. In this novel, the Baudelaire orphans live with the owner of Lucky Smells Lumber Mill. The book was published on April 15, 2000, by HarperCollins and illustrated by Brett Helquist.

<i>The Austere Academy</i> 2000 childrens novel

Book the Fifth: The Austere Academy is the fifth novel in the children's novel series A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket. The Baudelaire orphans are sent to a boarding school, overseen by monstrous employees. There, the orphans meet new friends, new enemies, and Count Olaf in disguises.

<i>The Ersatz Elevator</i> 2001 childrens novel

Book the Sixth: The Ersatz Elevator is the sixth novel of the children's novel series A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket. The Baudelaires are sent to live with the wealthy Esmé and Jerome Squalor.

<i>The Hostile Hospital</i> 2001 childrens novel

Book the Eighth: The Hostile Hospital is the eighth novel in the children's book series A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket, the pseudonym of Daniel Handler. It takes place shortly after The Vile Village and is followed by a sequel, The Carnivorous Carnival.

<i>The Carnivorous Carnival</i> 2002 childrens novel

Book the Ninth: The Carnivorous Carnival is the ninth novel in the children's novel series A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket.

<i>The Slippery Slope</i> 2003 childrens novel

Book the Tenth: The Slippery Slope is the tenth novel in the children's novel series A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket. It was illustrated by Brett Helquist and published on September 23, 2003. In the novel, Violet and Klaus Baudelaire make their way up the Mortmain Mountains to rescue their sister Sunny from Count Olaf and his troupe. They meet Quigley Quagmire, a character who they thought to be dead, and visit the headquarters of a mysterious organization called "V.F.D." They are reunited with Sunny and manage to escape from Olaf. The book has received positive reviews and been translated into several different languages.

<i>The Grim Grotto</i> 2004 childrens novel by Lemony Snicket

Book the Eleventh: The Grim Grotto is the eleventh novel in the children's book series A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket. The book was released on Tuesday, September 21, 2004.

<i>Lemony Snickets A Series of Unfortunate Events</i> 2004 film by Brad Silberling

Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events is a 2004 American black comedy adventure film directed by Brad Silberling from a screenplay by Robert Gordon, based on the first three novels of the book series A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Bad Beginning (1999), The Reptile Room (1999), and The Wide Window (2000), by Lemony Snicket. It stars Jim Carrey, Liam Aiken, Emily Browning, Timothy Spall, Catherine O'Hara, Billy Connolly, Cedric the Entertainer, Luis Guzmán, Jennifer Coolidge, and Meryl Streep, and Jude Law as the voice of Lemony Snicket.

<i>The End</i> (novel) 2006 childrens novel

Book the Thirteenth: The End is the thirteenth and final novel in the children's novel series A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket. The book was released on Friday, October 13, 2006.

<i>Lemony Snickets A Series of Unfortunate Events</i> (video game) 2004 video game

Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events is a 2004 action-adventure game based on the 2004 film of the same name. Players take the roles of Violet, Klaus, and Sunny Baudelaire, solving puzzles, fighting villains and finding objects. Players encounter characters such as Mr. Poe, Uncle Monty, and Aunt Josephine, along with villains such as Count Olaf, the Hook-Handed Man, the White-Faced Women, and the Bald Man with the Long Nose.

<i>The Penultimate Peril</i> 2005 childrens novel

Book the Twelfth: The Penultimate Peril is the twelfth novel in the children's novel series A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket.

<i>The Beatrice Letters</i> 2006 book by Lemony Snicket

The Beatrice Letters is a book by Lemony Snicket. It is a tangential prequel to the children's book series A Series of Unfortunate Events, and was published shortly before the thirteenth and final installment. According to its cover, the book is "suspiciously linked to Book the Thirteenth", although the British edition merely states that it "contains a clue to Book the Thirteenth".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lemony Snicket bibliography</span>

This is a list of books by Lemony Snicket, the pen name of American author Daniel Handler. Works published under the name Daniel Handler are not included. Handler, as Snicket, has published 26 fiction novels, thirteen in the main A Series of Unfortunate Events franchise. His works have been translated into more than 40 languages, and have sold more than 65 million copies.

<i>A Series of Unfortunate Events</i> (TV series) American streaming television series

A Series of Unfortunate Events is an American black comedy drama streaming television series based on the book series of the same name by Lemony Snicket for Netflix. It stars Neil Patrick Harris, Patrick Warburton, Malina Weissman, Louis Hynes, K. Todd Freeman, and Presley Smith. Dylan Kingwell, Avi Lake, and Lucy Punch join the cast in the second season.

References

  1. Snetiker, Marc (January 11, 2017). "Lemony Snicket speaks out about Netflix's Series of Unfortunate Events". Entertainment Weekly . Retrieved January 12, 2017.