The Carnivorous Carnival by Daniel Handler
Early in the Series of Unfortunate Events, readers could be forgiven for not quite believing Lemony Snicket's warnings that here was a tale to be avoided. Despite his doleful remonstrations that there were no happy endings, most of the installments in the series had proved that Snicket protested too much.
Yes, the orphans were subjected to a pretty bleak existence, but despite the sometimes Dickenseque conditions, they managed to overcome adversity using their wits and their interdependence.
In The Carnivorous Carnival, the reader begins to believe that perhaps the melancholy narrator isn't exaggerating. While things had been getting progressively darker in the series, the element of hopelessness starts to get a little stronger in this book and there are fewer and fewer people whom the readers can look upon sympathetically.
At the end of The Hostile Hospital, the Baudelaire orphans, Violet, Klaus, and Sunny, had hidden in the trunk of Count Olaf and his crew's trunk. They end up at the Caligari Carnival where Olaf is going to have his fortune told. It turns out that Madame Lulu, the fortune teller, has been able to tell Olaf where the Baudelaire children were hiding every time they moved.
The children disguise themselves as freaks applying to work in the House of Freaks. Sunny goes as a wolf/baby named Chabo and Violet and Klaus go as a two-headed person named Beverly and Eliot. Here they meet the other freaks, Hugo, Colette, and Kevin. Things soon turn dangerous, though, as Olaf decides the freaks need to get fed to the very hungry lions.
It's a grim tale that takes a dismal look at the victim mentality. Hugo, Colette, and Kevin consider themselves freaks because of the unusual abilities or shapes that they have. They possess disabilities that would qualify under the ADA only because they are perceived as being disabled, not because they really are. Yet, they convince themselves that they are victims and that their lives are miserable because of it. Snicket also explores how easy it is to corrupt those who see themselves as victims and the speed at which they'll turn on each other.
Madame Lulu has no moral compass, her only guiding principle is that she gives people what they want, no matter how immoral or dangerous that thing is. She could almost be a symbol for modern corporate and entertainment industry mentality where it is acceptable to produce and sell anything just so long as people want it.
Snicket also makes some strongly satiric statements about mob psychology and the cruelty of the majority. One of the reasons this book is dismal is not just because people die (though they do) or because the situation for the orphans worsens (it does) or because it ends on a very unhappy note (it does), but because of the depressing look at people in general. The Carnivorous Carnival takes a very dim view on humanity in general.
Which is not to say it is a bad book. Despite the very serious themes and the pessimistic outlook, it is a well-plotted, well-written book that continues to pose challenging questions while staying highly entertaining.
