/lit/ - Literature

I spent the last couple months reading these. It's a literary, thought provoking, and well written story.

A series is more than what it references, obviously, but I think the references say a lot. Sappho, Shakespeare, Pynchon, Salinger, Melville, Wilde, Henry James... and that's just what I remember off the top of my head. They're not only name drops, either. Some of them are subtle like the reference to the crying of lot 49. Some are critical of the referenced author. Some, like Salingers reference (a character names Esme Squalor) develop into interesting things on their own, blurring what's an homage or a criticism.

Count Olaf is a fantastic villain, and the prose is sharp and indulgent, but its not those things or the references that make the series impressive. It's the restraint. He layers mystery upon mystery into a great crescendo of tension, interweaving characters and secret organizations and conflict, all culminating in the last book which abandons 95% of it. Instead of answering all the set-up conspiracy, it takes a thematic, religious approach (please don't let this thread devolve into antisemitism) and leaves things in a state of suspension.

I picked these up because I spent most of last year struggling with Gravitys Rainbow and wanted to have something easy, but little did I know that I'd be reading Pynchon for a younger audience. I recommend anyone looking for something easy to give them a try. There's enough there to chew on.