The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortuate Events, Book the First)

by Lemony Snicket

While playing at the beach one gray day, the Baudelaire children, Violet, Klaus, and Sunny, get the bad news that their house has burned down and their parents died. This is not a good beginning for a story. Unfortunately things don’t get much better as the book continues. You see, the Baudelaire’s were very rich, so the orphans will inherit quite a fortune when they come of age. The first relative they are placed with, Count Olaf, has only this fortune in mind when he agrees to take the children in.

While the book does not start out or end happily, I found that I was drawn to the Baudelaire children, and I want to hope that eventually something good will happen for them. I look forward to see what happens in the next book.

I’ll admit that I got tired of the endless explanations of some of the words, but I can understand that most of the readers of these books are much, much younger than me, and probably need the extra help. I learned to just skim over those parts by the end of the book.