Daniel Handler ’92—best known for his children’s books “A Series of Unfortunate Events,” published under the pseudonym Lemony Snicket—shared a chapter from his latest novel, “Adverbs,” at a reading in Beckham Hall last Wednesday, Oct. 24. “Adverbs” marks Handler’s third novel published under his own name. He has also written several screenplays and is an accomplished accordion player, having played with acclaimed indie band The Magnetic Fields on their project “69 Love Songs.”
In seventeen vignettes, each inspired by a single adverb, Daniel Handler creates a world. Ranging from the playful “Collectively,” to the more serious “Briefly,” the chapters all address love and its many incarnations. Characters reappear throughout the novel, although it is ambiguous whether they are the same from previous chapters or Handler is simply reusing names. The interwoven narratives are captivating and sincere, and echo the unpredictability and messiness that love entails. Particularly gripping chapters include “Immediately,” in which a man falls desperately in love with his homophobic cabdriver, “Soundly,” which focuses on two friends who are coping with one’s final stages of a fatal disease, and “Frigidly,” which describes a boy, two mediocre detectives, and their interactions with an enchanted Snow Queen.
While confusing at times, overall “Adverbs” is a charming and thought-provoking collection of short stories where the characters are constantly in flux. Love is a complicated matter in Handler’s novel: he writes of the love between a husband and wife, of a love for saltwater taffy, and of a love that lasted for only a moment.
“You won’t believe how I love this guy. I can’t believe it either. Is it possible to love someone forever but not to think of him for years? Yes yes yes, oh baby yes. Is it possible to lose someone who only stepped in front of you once in a towel? Yes yes yes, oh baby yes. Grant me this, this brief murdered moment, and then I will bury it sadly and go on with my game,” he writes.
“Adverbs” portrays the candid kind of love that isn’t found in fairy tales, a love that can be pathetic, painful and endearing all at the same time. In “Particularly,” a distraught British substitute teacher, who is convinced that her husband David is cheating on her, assigns her students the task of writing “letters to her mother and read[ing] them out loud for creative expression.”
A particularly poignant and amusing letter reads, “Dear Mommy, Stop making Helena call the other way. You can’t live on love. You are a mean mommy and David and Andrea might be kissing. Oh, what shall I do? Your friend, Todd.”
Handler’s wicked sense of humor shines as he deals with both the triumphs and the tragedies of human emotion, and rarely does he strike a false chord. The stories are clever, heartbreaking, confusing, uplifting, thought-provoking and above all, honest. At one point in time, each of us has felt the same way as these characters do. Handler possesses the ability to write quirky and engaging characters whose flaws are believable and sometimes a little too familiar.
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