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The Truth Behind A Series of Unfortunate Events: Eyeballs, Leeches, Hypnotism and Orphans

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A Series of Unfortunate Events is one of the most popular children's series in the world and will be a major motion picture starring Jim Carrey and Meryl Streep coming this 2004 holiday season. Now comes The Reader's Guide to Lemony Snicket, the ultimate companion guide to these fun and wildly successful novels. Digging beneath the surface, Lois Gresh uses science, history and little known facts to dig deep into the world of A Series of Unfortunate Events and provide young readers everywhere with how-to hints and tips, quizzes, cool anecdotes, fun facts and information on everything Lemony. *Facts about handwriting analysis and forgery *Killer leeches, crabs, fungi and peppermint--all you need to know *The truth about hypnosis--and how to use it! *Real child inventors and their amazing inventions *How to build a telephone, a hot air balloon and an automatic harmonica *Are you as smart as Violet & Claus--the ultimate quiz *And much more! The ultimate renegade book report on A Series of Unfortunate Events, this reader's guide is a must for millions of young fans everywhere.

Unknown Binding

First published October 7, 2004

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About the author

Lois H. Gresh

73 books141 followers
LOIS H. GRESH is the New York Times Bestselling Author (6 times) and USA Today Bestselling Author (thrillers) of 30 books and more than 65 short stories. Look for SHERLOCK HOLMES VS. CTHULHU #1: THE ADVENTURE OF THE DEADLY DIMENSIONS (Titan Books, April 2017), the first in a new trilogy of Sherlock Holmes thrillers from England's premier publisher of all things Holmes, with Random House distribution in the USA. Lois’ books have been published in 22 languages. For five years, Lois was a staff book reviewer at scifi.com (now SYFY.com, the Science Fiction Cable Channel), and her work has been on national/international award ballots eight times. She is a frequent Guest of Honor Author at large fan conventions and has appeared on television series such as The History Channel’s Ancient Aliens and Batman Tech.

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5 stars
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Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
Profile Image for UmlautHerper.
112 reviews31 followers
December 18, 2012
I had a love hate relationship with this book. While the concept was fun, and the science was pretty good. I didn't actually finish reading the entire book, because I had to stop reading when the author started speculating about things that were actually explained in the books. That apparently our author Lois Gresh, didn't notice. I could forgive this a little bit, but they are rather big things that the author didn't notice, and for that I couldn't read the speculations.

I do think it's a fun idea to make a sort of guide for these sorts of books, because I think kids could have fun reading them, especially about things like the science the author discusses.

However I wish Lois would have fact checked better. Take for example the tattoo chapter, in the books, it is heavily implied, if not outright stated (late in the series, but as the book is supposed to cover the whole series you'd think Lois would have noticed) that the tattoo of the eye Olaf has on his ankle is actually a way that members of VFD could know who was who, and that this tattoo also looked a lot like the intials VFD. So it seems silly that Lois goes off on the tangent about it really being the Evil Eye. Even if the facts about the Evil Eye were interesting in and of themselves.

Another thing that bothered me was how much Lois tried to emulate the way Snicket wrote. I understand that it was sort of a fun feature of the books, the lamentable details he shared about himself in little snippets while delving into the Baudelaire's story, but I don't think it was necessary for Lois to write that way as well. Or at least not as much as she did.

One other thing, I started the last chapter about disguises and she said that as she read the series she wondered why the orphans didn't notice all of Olaf's disguises and run for the hills, but the thing is, in every single book, the orphans did always recognize that it was Olaf in disguise, it was every other character that had no clue each of the disguises was actually Count Olaf. That's a rather a big detail not to notice Ms. Gresh.

I don't want it to seem as if I hated the book, but I do think there were some major flaws that could have been improved upon before the book was published, even if it had no technical affiliation with Lemony Snicket or anything else to do with the series.

In summary, the science and facts were fun, but the author could have fact checked better to what she was writing about with regards to the Series of Unfortunate Events.

I also disliked how the book was arranged on the page, all her little fun fact commentaries, should have just been stuck at the end of each chapter, rather than awkwardly in the middle of things, where it affected the flow of the reading. It wouldn't have hurt to just stick those at the end of the chapters rather than cluttering up the middles.
Profile Image for Jennifer.
Author 23 books29 followers
January 3, 2014
Some libraries place this in the fiction section with the other Lemony Snicket books (it is written by Lois H. Gresh and published by a different company); others surprisingly place it in the non-fiction literature section. This book claims to delve into the truth of the Lemony Snicket series and answer such questions as: "what legal rights do orphans have; can someone be allergic to peppermints; how would your friends break the spells [of hypnotism]". However, if you are seeking the real answers to those questions I suggest you look them up in other non-fiction books.

While Lemony Snicket's books are all written intelligently, this author did not do enough research on her topic. Not only does she get things from the stories wrong (as mentioned by other reviewers), but she also gets the "research" wrong as well. Some things she gets right, such as: Margaret Knight was an inventor. Sadly, she fabricates or twists the history of those she speaks about from (Johann) Philip Reis to the Montgolfier brothers.

Her scientific "facts" are just as poorly researched. For example, she states that the Gila monster "releases its venom by shooting it down grooved teeth into the victim." Gila monsters chew their victim to release the venom and often turn upside down while doing it (their venom comes from the lower jaw area). She even contradicts herself when she makes a point that dangerous snakes are different from deadly snakes, and then goes on to say coral snakes are only dangerous snakes while listing the coral snake as a deadly snake.

Her "quizzes" are just as bad - she makes it impossible to score poorly. To add insult to injury, she attempts periodically to duplicate Lemony Snicket's style. Instead of offering insight into the Series of Unfortunate Events, she seems to have written the book with the sole purpose of pushing out drivel in time to make money off another author's hard work.
Profile Image for Lia (Taylor's Version).
192 reviews38 followers
September 17, 2021
no.

minor spoilers ahead, nothing that will hinder your enjoyment of ASOUE. (I covered certain things)

As a Volunteer, who has been a Volunteer for 4 almost 5 years, I beleive I am qualified to analyze this book. I know this series in and out. Now lets get on with this.

What I liked:
The Violet inventing thing was cool
When she made the couplets out of the big words, that was cool.

What I didn't like: (a lot)

1. Its pretty Heteronormative. Boys marry girls that kind of thing (i know it was published in 2004 but still
2. Relating to the heteronormativity in the book it said, and I quote
"and if you are a girl the clothes aren't exactly the kind of stuff you see on Christina and Britney. If you're a guy, you're not exactly going to be a CHICK MAGNET in the slammer where there are no chicks to magnetize.
-First problem is WTF?
-The second problem is STOP WITH THE MALE STEREOTYPING OMFG
-The third problem is SOME WOMEN ARE NOT FEMININE, STOP WITH THE FEMALE
STEREOTYPING OMFG
-The fourth problem is SOME OF US ARE GAY KAREN

3. SHE INSULTED MY DUNCAN
She described what Quagmire means, the she said it would be unfortunate to have Duncan's name because "dunk in quagmire" if you don't know what a quagmire is, look it up. To me that's an insult, and I take offense.

4. There is a lot of unnecessary info. What the author does is brings a random thing from ASOUE and dives into it completely unnecessarily. Like the crocodiles, knowing all about the difference between crocodiles and alligators does not make any of us know anything more about ASOUE. Klaus already told us what we need to know for that specific situation we didn't need to know anything else. See what i'm saying, that's practically what happens throughout the whole book.

5. There is nothing about VFD lore or VFD really at all, and VFD is extremely important to ASOUE and understanding it as a whole. The eye is the logo for VFD, that wasn't mentioned once. It said something about finding the person to see if the belive in the all seing eye (something similar) and she doesn't eve know what that eye is or that VFD is hidden in the eye. Disappointing.

6. The Author said, and I quote "So it is quite possible that Klaus could have come out of his hypnotic state long before his hypnosis actually broke." this choice of words was very bad because it seems like

7. So we all know that Lemony Snicket uses big words, and in this book the author put the definitions of these words and added a few of her own and added definitions for them as well. This is completely unnecessary because Lemony Snicket does that for us and if not him then Violet, Klaus, or any other character. And if they don't tell us a direct description of the word you usually can figure it out in context.

8. This book is barely about ASOUE and it's more about a random topic dived into for no particular reason

9. the author said and I quote "I kept thinking why don't the orphans know who he is? Why don't they realize he is Count Olaf, and run away quickly, very quickly." I'm sorry have you not read ASOUE? The Baudelaire's know its Olaf right away, they can't run. Running from Olaf is useless. And plus they can't run because they were put under care of their guardians at least from books 1 to 7. They couldn't run from Olaf in the Hostile Hospital because Violet was about to get decapitated and so Klaus and Sunny couldn't just leave.

10. She was trying really hard to be Lemony Snicket in terms of writing style and format and use of words and sentences. Even the 'about the author' thing was super super similar to Lemony Snicket's to the point where it was sarcastically plagiarism. In terms of humor as well, she was trying way too hard to be someone that she isn't even using similar motifs that Lemony Snicket uses in ASOUE.

11. Olaf is not stealing people's identities, he is an ACTOR and he has costumes and he knows how to be somebody that he really isn't. Maybe he took ideas from other people, but it's not like he was stealing people's id's out of trash cans like it was mentioned in this book. Also, Olaf takes the place of people it's not like he's stealing somebody's personal information and using it for himself.

12. This book says a lot about the author that has nothing to do with what this book is supposed to be about. I know what she's trying to do because Lemony Snicket does the same thing ( she clearly got the idea from L.S) as in bringing own his own personal experiences into ASOUE, so you can better understand something. A lot of cases in this book that is not what happened and it just came off as unnecessary rambling

This book doesn't help you understand ASOUE better, just read ASOUE. And the companions.

now, I can appreciate that she took things from ASOUE into her own writing. I think that was overall clever to do, and I respect that. These are just my opinions.

no hate to the author intended. :)

Read ASOUE
Profile Image for Tina Rae.
1,029 reviews
November 20, 2009
I actually really liked this book. It was almost as good or just as good as the actual ASOUE books. The author writes a lot like Lemony Snicket. Or maybe it really is Lemony Snicket. Who knows? Anyway, great, great book.
Profile Image for Emme.
8 reviews
June 15, 2019
Horrible, horrible, "guide" to A Series of Unfortunate Events. The author makes up her own ideas to things that were already explained in the books by the time this one was published. She also gets many scientific facts wrong, and seems more like she heard about the books from a friend, rather than reading them herself. She mentions several times that Count Olaf is the Baudelaires' uncle, but it's explicitly stated in the book that he is at the very most and extremely distant cousin, but more than likely is just a "friend" and fellow volunteer of their parents.

A lot of places put this with the Lemony Snicket books, but it's certainly not up to par with them. Please skip this!
Profile Image for Lily mymy.
13 reviews
April 26, 2021
VERY BORING!!!!(This is not a hate report I personally enjoy this author I just thought this wasn't a good book) I am personally A big series of unfortunate events fan And I thought this book was dull and uninteresting. It was like a very uninteresting science / history book.On the back of the book there is a big warning that says this is not associated with Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events So we're not even sure how much of this book is True& that was a big turn off for me.The quizzes inside this book we're decent But ultimately I would not recommend this book for anybody.It is a waste of time.
Profile Image for Kat.
226 reviews8 followers
April 11, 2019
Picked this up under the pretense that it would be a writer attempting to demystify some of the myriad of Lemony Snicket twists and turns. I feel reddit does a better job. I mean it's not bad but as I kid I would have felt tricked, that each chapter begins with remarking on ASOUE before delving into insipid and unnecessary explanations about stuff the reader isn't necessarily looking for: would this have interested me aged 11, not really, does it interest me now: no.
Profile Image for Ashley.
491 reviews
July 25, 2011
Not quite what I was looking for as for answers to Lenomy Snicket. Written before book 13, it was more of a research into if some creatures and events could have realisticly happened to the orphans. A good addition for younger readers who do not have a clear understanding or want to know more about horseradish and Leeches!
28 reviews
February 26, 2015
I've read a lot of the lemony snickett books and this one just didn't make sense to me. The author contradicted themselves. I wouldn't recommend the book.
Profile Image for Andrew.
23 reviews12 followers
October 29, 2018
Although the book doesn’t delve into the Snicket universe and much as I would have liked it to – this is a must have Snicket super fans out there. The chapter on ‘Hypnotism’ was really interesting.
Profile Image for Siarra.
99 reviews
October 11, 2023
A cute book.

Not associated with any official A Series of Unfortunate Events parties and written before all of those books were published, we can surely forgive the author some trespasses.

Additionally, it’s written for kids to contextualize some topics covered in Snicket novels with the real world.

Disappointing that no one caught the inconsistencies about the coral snake in writing or editing, but overall a cute book with interesting facts and musings.

Perhaps oversells itself a little.
Profile Image for Lillian Elliott.
203 reviews50 followers
March 30, 2022

I read this book because it was on my bookshelf and I didn't feel like searching for a good book the night I started it, so I grabbed the first thing I saw. It was entertaining and semi-informative, which was its goal. It wasn't a particularly good book, but it was a fun, quick read and I learned a few things. Lois H. Gresh talks about the real ideas behind events from Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events. I thought it would be similar to the Magic Tree House books that accompany the fiction stories and tell the facts and history behind it, but it was only remotely similar to that. It didn't focus on research and facts as much as fun and funniness. It talked about how young kids could actually invent the things they did at home, had quizzes similar to the ones you'd find in teen magazines, and grammar lessons. It was obviously aimed at younger kids, but it wouldn't teach anyone of any age much, excluding the chapters on fungi and snakes. However, said chapters were interesting and informative, although they did not give many details.


When I picked this up I wanted to learn some cool, random facts and The Truth Behind A Series of Unfortunate Events included a few of those, so I was satisfied. It was not very informative, but it was entertaining, which was what I was looking for at the moment. It was a quick, funny read that left me with slightly more knowledge than I had before I read it. I would not recommend it, neither to children nor adults, but it was enjoyable.

Profile Image for Jennifer Wardrip.
Author 5 books516 followers
November 11, 2012
Reviewed by Mechele R. Dillard for TeensReadToo.com

Ever heard of an automatic harmonica? Need to learn to pick a lock? Did you know there are 650 species of leeches? Fans of the Lemony Snicket series A SERIES OF UNFORTUNATE EVENTS will want to keep this unauthorized companion handy, and newcomers will find Gresh's "Ultimate Book Report about Lemony Snicket" (p. 192) a helpful resource when diving into the series for the first time.

Gresh's main goal appears to be to easily flow learning opportunities into The Truth without interrupting the reader's enjoyment. She accomplishes this by combining events from the series with academic enlightenment. For example, in Chapter Five, she references Book the Second, THE REPTILE ROOM, within a discussion of herpetology, frog facts, and a text-box entitled, "The Most Deadly Snakes in the World" (pp. 57-60). In another instance, Gresh references Count Olaf from the first book, THE BAD BEGINNING. She includes Count Olaf's attempt to trick fourteen-year-old Violet into marrying him without the young girl's knowledge in Chapter Eight, among details of legal marrying ages in not only states throughout the U.S., but also other countries, as well as text-boxes entitled "Marital Law in Ancient Rome" and "Marital Law in Ancient Greece" (pp. 105-8).

Overall, although unauthorized, the facts, insights, and quizzes offered by Gresh make the world of Lemony Snicket seem a bit less "unfortunate."
Profile Image for Erin O'Riordan.
Author 42 books138 followers
March 23, 2015
Young readers who are very curious about science and who also like the Lemony Snicket books will enjoy this complementary volume. Young biology enthusiasts may find themselves fascinated with the discussions of fungi, leeches and snakes. Personally, I thought some of the chapters were a little long-winded and a bit boring. If you're not so much a science fan and looking for more insight into the Baudelaires, read Lemony Snicket: The Unauthorized Autobiography.
Profile Image for Johannah.
7 reviews
April 29, 2013
This was an extremely fun/funny book. It'd be a great one to read to little kids (especially little brothers and nephews). As far as the included quizzes go... well, just don't dive into this thinking you already know everything. :) 4 stars for the combination of wit, humor, and information. It was, overall, put together very well, and is a relaxing easy read.
Profile Image for Sonia Jarmula.
305 reviews3 followers
July 5, 2012
I learned a lot from this book, interesting tidbits and history that makes a person interesting and intelligent, but the author really annoyed me, too obviously trying to be funny and failing completely.
Profile Image for Akhila.
48 reviews
September 26, 2012
The author has a wonderful voice throughout the book. My only disagreement is that I don't like how there are a pages of facts jutted in between pages of the main body. Apart from that, trying to write like Lemony but not making me cringe or throw it against the wall.
Profile Image for Kate.
269 reviews18 followers
April 11, 2017
I like the idea behind this book but the execution was poor.

I, like another reviewer, was confused by the tangent on the evil eye when Olaf's tattoo is thoroughly explained in the series. I attributed it to the fact that not all of the books were out yet at the time Gresh wrote her book, but I'm not sure whether that fully explains it, or other inconsistencies.

There are also inconsistencies in the "facts" themselves, and I'm not fond of the tone. It is clear Gresh was trying to mimic Snicket's style, but it mostly didn't work.
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