We Are Pirates

This book was very hard to enjoy, but I enjoyed it anyway.

Handler writing as Snickett wrote some of my favorite books of all times (really, the Series of Unfortunate events just may have made me a slightly better person), but I was somewhat disappointed with a few other of his books I ventured into. I was not sure what to think, but I won a copy of Pirates and a request for a review, so I decided to work through it no matter what. I am glad I did.

We are pirates begins with deliberate attempts to confuse the reader and to create a surreal and bleak world, both physically and psychologically. Handler succeeds in disorienting us from the first chapter, and this disorientation continues to the end. He also succeeds in creating a cast of utterly unlikable characters–the world he presents here, if it were the real one, I think I might become an advocate of suicide.

The basic plot – disaffected and unattached people run away to become pirates – could be the foundation for a rollicking good time book, full of fun and adventure. I thought perhaps that was where the book was heading. Handler quickly pulled that rug out from under my feet, which at this point in history is a phrase that means he took me by surprise and suddenly removed support for my misguided idea. Well, I shan't tell what happens, but when our pirates raid their first ship, it was a tough read.

I'm glad I finished. For all the book's difficulties and Handler's refusal to make the fun book I was hoping for, at the end I believed that I had read about real people, who really changed because of their encounter with the same real life I meet every day. I did not enjoy it so much as respect it. Handler played with my emotions and he won.