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Feb 25, 2009

Chris rated it:

I am not a violent man. In my lifetime, I have never been in a fight. I've never seriously threatened anyone with violence, never made anyone feel afraid by my physical presence, never even really seriously considered doing violence to another person.

Having said that, the feelings this book evoked in me were... violent.

Not because Lemony Snicket has written a book where terribly unfortunate things happen to small children - I have no problems with that and in fact encou More...

90 comments like (77 people liked it)

Nov 22, 2011

Monk rated it:

I never really did get into Harry Potter. I imagine that this is viewed as a crime by most everyone on this service. For some it is heresy. But, I refuse to stand shamefaced - Hogwarts just didn't do it for me.

I didn't think this would either.

However, I was more than pleasantly surprised. I am of a somewhat morbid streak, and the Series of Unfortunate Events books, I must say, tickles that grotesque bone in a way most pleasing.

The story of the Baudelaire Child More...

2 comments like (9 people liked it)

Feb 25, 2008

Lizziegolightly rated it:

When I was a child, I learned a thing or two from reading the works of Roald Dahl. The most important of these lessons is that adults are, more often than not, either evil or oblivious and, to co-opt Lemony Snicket's writing style, by oblivious I mean "lacking conscious awareness; unmindful."

As an adult, I have only received mountains of proof substantiating the notion that adults are either evil or oblivious. All you need to do is watch the news or enter the workforce and yo More...

2 comments like (18 people liked it)

Dec 26, 2011

Natalia rated it:

I remember being a kid, and feeling powerless in an adult world. where adults acted in ways that seemed inexplicable and capricious to me at the time. I enjoyed this book as a caricature of that feeling, exaggerated to an entertaining degree.

I think the fact that I listened to the audiobook read by Tim Curry increased my enjoyment of the book. I got the impression it was really intended to be enjoyed out loud, and they couldn't have picked a better narrator. (Though I did find myself More...

1 comment like (4 people liked it)

Dec 17, 2009

fleegan rated it:

Okay, I know this is a popular series and all, but frankly, I just don't see the charm. I do like that there's lots of vocabulary lessons in the book, but I don't like that the book is basically about child abuse. No, really. You want to write a kid's book? Fine. You want to write a kid's book about child abuse? Fine. Great even. But for the love, abuse is a serious thing, m'kay? And? AND? THE PART WHERE THE EVIL, GREEDY UNCLE TRIES TO MARRY THE 14 YEAR OLD ORPHAN GIRL?! EW! HELLO?! MR. SNICKET, More...

11 comments like (8 people liked it)

Sep 29, 2011

Qt rated it:

I think I will really like this series--I like the style, and the resourceful Baudelaire siblings make good protagonists (and scary Count Olaf is a very creepy villain!)

7 comments like (3 people liked it)

Dec 26, 2011

Lisa rated it:

This is such an interesting children's book. It is very dark and not what you'd expect from a book for children.

I love my copy of the book with this cover & in hardback. The character's are three children who seem wise beyond their years.

In a way, this reminded me of the movie "Matilda"(I haven't read the book). Matilda is about a girl who gets treated badly by her family but is incredibly smart and resilient.

This book is about three children whose More...

4 comments like (2 people liked it)

Jul 21, 2007

Millie rated it:

I love the entire Lemony Snicket Series of Unfortunate Events. This book came out at the most opportune time to offer an alternative to the saccharine niceness of the abysmally ubiquitous Harry Potter, and thank goodness for that (I'm sure the monolithic HP franchise inspired, at least in part, the conception of Lemony Snicket, Count Olaf and the Baudelaires). The writing style encourages readers to question language and the function language plays in our lives while describing the ill-fated liv More...

0 comments like (5 people liked it)

Mar 23, 2009

Morgan rated it:

Unlikeable, flat, contrived, and joyless. This is for fans of snuff flicks and Dickens. I blame Godard.

I also should add that I think this book enforces a poor lesson for abused kids. I understand the desire for gruesomeness in children's fantasy, but this touches on real world concepts of abusive homes and teaches that seeking help from neighbors, teachers, and librarians will not help you. I'd preferred that the neighbor was killed wanting to help, than the way this book was se

7 comments like (4 people liked it)

Dec 26, 2011

Chandra rated it:

I enjoyed this introduction to the plight of the Baudelaire orphans. There were parts I really loved - mainly the beginning and the end, and there were parts I thought were just okay - most of the stuff in the middle. It just got a little draggy and formulaic feeling for a bit so that I wasn't really clamoring to finish it. I'm all for black humor and satire, and so sometimes I wish Snicket would have made more of a firm commitment in that direction. All that said, however, I would still lik More...

11 comments like (2 people liked it)

Jul 16, 2008

Suzanne rated it:

Ugh. Rarely have I read a book so artificial, trite and purposefully unpleasant. I do like Edward Gorey, so I thought that the allusive title would be more in the spirit of the weird and delightfully obscure. However, I found this book to be calculated and unoriginal, with nothing of whimsy or genuine strangeness. In addition, it was clumsily written in a deliberately stilted style none the more charming for being intentional. I don't entirely understand the popularity of this series, but suspec More...

6 comments like (5 people liked it)

Dec 06, 2008

Jennifer rated it:

I am not sure why I picked this up - Maybe I was hoping to capture some of the Harry Potter goodness in a different series? Not sure. But I did read this and I found it both irritating and compelling.

The themes were pretty darn adult in this book (series), but the writing was aimed at 7 year olds. The children are told their parents are dead on the first page of the book and that they are to stay with their Uncle Olaf - Who is a bad bad man. The children are pretty much abused by th More...

6 comments like (3 people liked it)

Dec 27, 2011

Elliot rated it:

I've always linked Daniel Handler and J.D. Salinger in my mind. Allusion can always fraudulently masquerade as reincarnation, but the connection between the two goes beyond Esme Squalor and her husband Jerome and the explicit references to Nine Stories in The Unauthorized Autobiography. (After all, despite his love of the Gothic, I don't envision Handler as Edgar Allen Poe simply because of the Baudelaires' executor.)

Snicket, Handler's creation, is the Seymour Glass who Seymour Glass n More...

3 comments like (1 person liked it)

Dec 26, 2011

Kim rated it:

A thankfully short book I really don't get what everyone sees in it. I know it's written for children but that constant addition of definitions was annoying. The whole thing just felt a little off. I don't think I'll be reading the rest of the series.

1 comment like (2 people liked it)

Jan 07, 2009

Lori rated it:

Even though this is a book for younger readers, I enjoyed the story telling. I also enjoyed how the author would explain words or phrases which will help advance the vocabulary of young readers. It's a quick read about 3 children who are inventive in finding ways to improve their situation and get out of danger. Even though it is the series of unfortunate events, it was fun to see how Violet, Klaus and Sunny end up fixing the problems they encounter. While it isn't my favorite series, I am e More...

2 comments like (1 person liked it)

Dec 26, 2011

LauraT rated it:

Mi piace molto l'ironia che smaschera le ipocrisie degli adulti: meglio il conte Olaf - almeno sappiamo esattamente cosa aspetarci da lui - che il mitico avvocato o la giudice imbelle (o imbecille?)
Delizioso il modo di scrivere di Snicket: è semplice, scorrevole, ma non usa volontariamente solo un vocabolario trito: aggiunge termini un pò più "alti" e li spiega pure: noi siamo tutti adulti, ma se il libro, come è espressamente indirizzato, è nelle mani di un bambino diciamo di s More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Dec 28, 2008

Justin rated it:

I read this in a night while visiting my folks. They went to bed and my mom has all the Snicket books so I thought I'd read one. I'd seen the movie and thought it was great and I've heard nothing but excellent things about this series. I sat down by the wood stove, started reading and, forty five minutes later, I was done.

It was a great forty five minutes! The writing style is so funny and quirky and engaging. The story is superbly paced and the characters are a lot of fun. Who More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Dec 05, 2008

Adriana rated it:

The Bad Beginning, the first book out of thirteen in Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events tells a fictional story about the start of all the tragedies in the lives of the three Baudelaire children.
The Baudelaire’s misfortunes come into play when they receive the awful news from Mr. Poe, a Banker in charge of their enormous fortune that their house has burned down and their parents had died in the incident. Requested in their parents will that their guardian mus More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Nov 20, 2008

Jacquelyn rated it:

Audio review:
Genre: Fiction Reading level: Age 9+
Can a book be both humor and horror? From the author’s fictitious name to his odd style and use of vocabulary, this series breaks the mold of the traditional juvenile story. The Baudelaire orphans are not a cheerful bunch. The reader is warned, in no uncertain terms, to read something else should they desire a happy book. Each of the three children relies on their own special talent to rescue the siblings from one scrape after ano More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Oct 06, 2008

Kevin cnca rated it:

The book of a series of unfortunate events is a really good book. If you like a book that has characters that are smart in any situation then you would finish the whole series. The main characters are sunny the infant of the house, Klaus the book worm of the house and then we have violet the gadget lady. They get all of their smartness from both parents.
The plot of my book is for count Olaf, the "uncle" they never met, he is trying to steal their fortune. He tries to do many More...

1 comment like

Jul 04, 2009

Nic rated it:

I had heard of these books, of course; I saw the movie, and a friend recommended the series to me, so I thought I'd try them. I felt a little silly going around with something so clearly written for younger readers, but a good story is a good story.

The author definitely has something here. In a way, it's the ultimate "orphan story," because bad things just keep happening to the, well, orphans. They're likeable characters, and the consistent unhappy endings to the books g More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Aug 21, 2007

Punk rated it:

YA, Miserable Orphan Fiction. Everyone knows about the Baudelaire children and how their parents died in a fire, leaving them Dismal Orphans. I find the word "orphan" funny, so I got giggles out of how Count Olaf is constantly addressing the children as such (eg. "Good morning, orphans."), and I liked the narrator's self insertions, his snide little vocabulary lessons and colorful language, but the story itself wasn't anything special. Part of that is because I saw the movie More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Dec 26, 2011

stormhawk rated it:

I don't know the last time I encountered a book, much less a series of books, that is as horribly delightful as A Series of Unfortunate Events!

I read a few of these courtesy of a drop of on my apt's mailroom table, and had been waiting for an opportunity to scarf up the rest. Amazon's Kindle has made that easier than ever.

The adventures of the Bauldelaire Orphans gets off to a smoldering start as they encounter Evil Count Olaf and the somewhat clueless Mr. Poe for the fir More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Dec 26, 2011

Amy rated it:

A series of unfortunate events, The bad beginning by Lemony Snicket
The bad beginning is the story about Baudelaire siblings (Violet, Klaus and Sunny) who are suddenly orphaned, by a fire at their house. They are sent to live with Count Olaf who is there closet living relative who is a foul and evil man who is only after the Baudelaire fortune.
I loved the way this book was written, Snicket uses developing langue in places and to take the reader with him explains the meaning of the word More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Nov 14, 2010

Sonia rated it:

Come fare a non essere stregati dalle sfigatissime avventure dei fratelli Baudelaire??? 13 libri da bere come fumetti (peccato perchè sono brevi) che ti portano all'ultimo ad una velocità altissima...
gli interrogativi saranno tanti ad ogni momento e.. resteranno tali anche alla fine!</p>

GDL Una serie di sfortunati eventi

Aspettavo da tempo la possibilità di dedicarmi di nuovo alle vicende degli orfani Baudelaire per poterle apprezzare meglio, capirci qualcosa in più, far caso ai particolar

More...

0 comments like

Apr 01, 2009

Jared rated it:

I have read the book, The Bad Beginning by Lemony Snicket. In this book, there are three main characters, Violet, Klaus, and Sunny. Violet is the oldest, Klaus is in between and Sunny is a baby. Violet, is fourteen years old, and is a very smart girl. She likes to invent things, and she wishes she could spend all of her time inventing things. Violet thinks that it is important to take care of her younger siblings, and she does a great job at it.
Klaus likes to spend a lot of his time read More...

0 comments like

Mar 10, 2009

Tara rated it:

I saw this series for the first time years ago, as a completely thrilled (yeah, I'm a geek,) Barnes and Noble employee.

After waiting patiently for most of the series to become available, I bought books 1-10, and sat down to read.

This has be one of the most enjoyable children's series I've read in a LONG time. Far from the usual formulaic "orphans are in a bad situation, but everything conveniently works out alright in the end," the Baudelaire orphans have a to More...

0 comments like

Feb 06, 2012

Yumi rated it:

I finished reading "Lemony Snicket: A Series of Unfortunate Events No.1" in English. Actually, I finished reading it one month ago, but I forgot to write the review in English. So, today I want to write it.

The book was my American friend's recommendation. While he was staying my house, we went to a book store near my house together. At the time, he suggested it to me. While he was showing the book to me, he told me that if I prefer the stories with happy ending, I shouldn't More...

0 comments like

Feb 01, 2012

Amanda rated it:

I picked up this entire series at a thrift store and thought myself pretty lucky....when the lucky person was the one who donated the books to the thrift store! I started reading this book to my kids and was almost immediately turned off.... to quote another reviewer:

"Let's face it - if this book is written for adults, then the author should treat his readers like adults. If the book is written for children, which this ostensibly is, then the author has to choose whether to tal More...

0 comments like

Jan 17, 2012

Lindsey rated it:

The three Blaudaires (Voilet, Klaus, Sunny) had a bad beginning in there life when their parents had died in the house during a house fire when they were on the beach. They were sent to their relative Count Olaf. Count Olaf was a very mean guy becasue he was constantily trying to find a way to steal the Blaudiare forunate, which Voilet (the oldest Blaudaire) couldn't inheriate yet. They wish they could live with the Counts lovely next door neighbour, Judge Strauss. She is a lovely lady More...

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