For Beatrice - 
 Dead women tell no tales. 
 Sad men write them down. 
 This one was more tedious than most of the others. Several times he described the science behind the water cycle, and it got old. He did this to encourage the reader to fall asleep so they wouldn't have to read the sad events that followed, but still enough was enough by the third time it happened. He also defines words or explains phrases much more often than usual, and he did that often enough as it was. It seems like it's happening every other page at this point. Some of the phrase explanations were accompanied by two or three examples. I'm not kidding: this book could've been 175 pages instead of 323. A little bit of that is fine, but I'm feeling inundated with it. Still, it is educational if you don't already know the words or phrases, and even though I knew most of them I realize I'm not the target audience. 
 I love the things I loved in the other books, and gripe about the same things I griped about in those as well. Since they are all discussed in my other ten reviews, I won't rehash the rest of it all here. 
 The story itself was quite good. Things are progressing along, some secrets are getting solved, others are cropping up. The Baudelaires actually catch a break a couple of times, so there's hope things will turn out OK by the end of the last book. Still not holding my breath for that, though. Two to go, and I'll know. 
 Since I'm always so impressed with Sunny's words, I'll leave a couple of quotes here. As always they refer to something else. It's often literary, but not always. Sometimes it's scientific: 
 "Oxo?" Sunny asked, which meant "Does that mean we can breathe without our helmets?" 
 Other times it's historical: 
 "Hewenkella," Sunny said. Her voice was muffled inside the helmet and it was difficult for even her siblings to know what she was saying. 
 "I think my sister is curious about how we'll be able to see our way," Violet said. "Does the Queequeg have any waterproof flashlights?" 
 And thus do we segue to the most important part of this book (to me, at least). The name of the submarine is the Queequeg! No, I'm not all excited because that's the name of a character in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale. I've never read MB, and might never get to it. I own it, it's on my to-read shelf, but it intimidates me. Stephen King has said he can't make it through it though he's tried a few times, and lowercase karen has this to say about it. I intend to try it myself one day, but I'm certainly in no hurry, especially after reading that review. 
 So why does the name Queequeg titillate me so? Because it's also the name of a character in Knowhutimean? Hey Vern, It's My Family Album!, a crappy, straight-to-video Ernest movie from the 80's where he puts on several skits depicting members of his family. 
 "BOOGIE!" 
 I am one of two people in the world who actually like this thing. (There used to be three of us, but sadly the third is no longer with us.) Queequeg (pronounced Kwee-Kway) has been a running joke for us for the past 25 or so years right along with "Well, I don't know; I could use a new toaster," and who doesn't fall into a fit of hysterics when they hear that?! In the last skit, Pop (grandpa) Worrell takes Ernest fishing, and as they walk to the pond he goes on and on with the most non-linear, nonsensical, stream-of-conscious ramble I've ever heard. Due to my poor hearing and the fact that this DVD is so cheap it doesn't even offer a closed captioning option, I'm pretty sure I'm going to butcher this to hell and breakfast as far as direct quoting goes, but here's the essence: 
 "I sure do like that baseball. Course, that was back when me an Harriet were down in New Orleans. Carl & Lewis were behind us in one of them flying Tiger airplanes, and changed their clothes. Did I ever tell you about the time me and Harriet were in a group called the Andrews sisters? I was Lavern and she was Shirley. How about the time me and Queequeg were shipwrecked in Denver? It was my turn at bat, then I lost both my shoes. Maybe I left them in back of a '51 Hudson with a soup can. I don't know. That was when Harriet was in New Orleans. They had patented a way to make chocolate chip cookies last forever by using back donated ammo and high explosives. Then she took up with a guy who kept a bunch of those old World War I torpedoes in the front of a '36 Chrysler. Did you ever see a gypsy woman take her ring and turn it into a tablecloth? Course, that was in '34. You don't remember '34. Anyway, that was a blond who was a Nazi spy who run away from where they had her imprisoned, and made a small fortune in formaldehyde lingerie. That was when Harriet crash landed that flying tiger airplane in the parking lot of the First National Bank of Billings, Montana and caught a strange virus that she gave to Queequeg, and he took to London and traded it for a '36 Studebaker. I was sitting on an I beam, an opened my lunchbox, and inside was a piece of a great white buffalo, so I wrapped that baseball up with a blanket, and took it on home for the other torpedoes." 
 Well, you get the idea. This book is technically 3.5 stars thanks to the Ernest association (BOOGIE!), but I decided to disregard my usual rule and round down instead of up this time because I can't in good conscience give it four stars. And like I said, the story is good. On to The Penultimate Peril. 
 Author's Bio: 
 LEMONY SNICKET has received several citations for bravery in the face of evil and several more for caution when bravery might have proven to be more trouble than it was worth. He was last seen by witnesses who proved to be unreliable and/or of a particularly suspicious nature. In his spare time he hides all traces of his actions. 
 Brett Helquist (boring bio stuff here.) In order to depict the tragic lives of the Baudelaire orphans, he uses broken pencils, dried-up paint, and boxes and boxes of tissues.