The illustrations for the books are very reminiscent of Edward Gore's, and have a very Addams-family feel to them. There have been, so far, 8 sequels to Rare Beasts and these books continue the adventures of the twins.

In the first of their adventures, they conspire to kidnap all of the pets of the children who live in their town, transform them through the use of old Christmas ornmanets, paint, and glitter, thus transforming them into 'rare beasts' that the townspeople will surely buy for their sad little children. Without adult supervision (their parents are away on an extended holiday), the twins wreak havoc on the town of Nod's Limbs. It's like Beetlejuice had children and they inherited his nastiness without any of his funny.įor fans of the Unfortunate Events books, here is a series were the children take charge of events! Edgar and Ellen are twins who live in a mansion with their pet named Pet. Edgar and Ellen have no fears, dreams, wishes, hopes for the future, or goals for anything beyond discovering new ways to ruin everyone's day. This isn't even a case with a quirky-but-likable weirdo character that nobody understands, but they do what they want and have a cute adventure (à la Ruby Gloom or even Emily the Strange). The characters and their detestability are what made me give this book such a low ranking. A book for children doesn't have to be sub-par, and Rare Beasts certainly isn't! The author doesn't dumb this down or make the plot too simple with gaping plot holes, as I've seen in other children's books. The writing is very excellent, and words such as 'schadenfreude' are used, which are always a plus. This did nothing to endear them to me, since I detest animal cruelty, but then the way they behave toward each other was repugnant as well.Įdgar and Ellen have one character dimention: NASTY. This is nothing compared to how they treat their own pet - an outlet for them to experiment on and try new cruel things.

They want to be able to buy materials to flood the city or ruin everyone's day, so they decide to kidnap all the children's pets and disguise them with glitter, glue, and paint, and then try to sell them back to the townspeople for insane prices. Seriously, that's their main driving force in this book.

The twins, Edgar and Ellen, are detestable, one-dimensional, self-centred, unrepentant, and pathetic characters that spend their time thinking up new ways to be bad and stir up trouble.

Rare beasts charles ogden