Rating: 
Summary: Better than the first version -- The Banal Beginning
Review: I am pleased to report that Mr. Snicket's first chronicle of the Baudelaire children is suitably bad. Had it been what apparently constitutes "good" these days, I'm sure there would be no need for an endless string of sequels designed to correct everything that is wrong about this volume.That said, I thought this would be the perfect story to read to my 8-year-old niece. I put on my best Tim Curry impression, and commenced reading. Within no more than 50 words, my efforts were rebuffed. My niece, an obvious connoisseur of good books, indicated that she vastly preferred good stories of children with lightning bolts burnt onto their foreheads over repulsive tales of gangly, unshaved men with eyes tattooed to their ankles. Maybe if I had brought in the real Tim Curry (or bought the book-on-tape, as I found out later), it would have gone down a bit easier. So I was left to wallow in the misery of the Baudelaire orphans. Mr. Snicket chronicles the first in what is apparently a series of misadventures involving a trio of young moppets who face disaster at every step. What is their appeal? Besides their inventiveness, their literacy, and, of course, their very sharp teeth, these three children are probably nothing like you, gentle review reader. After all, surely no children ever fantasize about being orphaned and surviving solely by their wits. And what of the hero, Count Olaf? I fear that Mr. Snicket may have been unfair in his characterization of this abundantly talented thespian. Surely, his generosity in extending shelter and entertaining his unfortunate but distant relatives has been misinterpreted after his attempts to bring them fame and additional fortune by including them in his current theatrical production. Truly, I expect that the later chronicles of The Series of Unfortunate Events will vindicate the Count, just as the delightfully pedantic Mr. Snicket is sure to attempt to describe "irony" to his readers. A good thing, too, or how else will they understand the subtexts to the film REALITY BITES, which they will be sure to encounter later in life.
Rating: 
Summary: The Series of the Unfortunate Events: the Bad Beggining
Review: This story is about three unlucky children who get adopted. Count Olaf, the man who adopted them, has thought of a plan to try and get the Baudelaire fortune. The three kids are Sunny, the little one, Kluas, who alwas likes to read, and Voilet, the oldest Bauldelaire kid. They are always getting chores to do in the morning from the Count. They think he's up to no good! It's up to the Buadelaire kids to stop his evil plans. I recommend this book if you like unpleasant tales with plots that will never end!
Rating:
Summary: A little bit of everything
Review: I give it five stars because it's funny and it teaches us about life and vocabulary.It teaches us about life by letting us see how horrible it is for the main characters.Also it is a tragic book because their parents die in a fire.It has three very unique characters with a unfortunate story.It's funny because Sunny(a character,age one) uses a funny,different,and weird language.
Rating:
Summary: The best book I ever read
Review: I thought this book was very interesting. I liked how they described the characters. It has alot of new vocabulary. I really enjoyed this book.
Rating: 
Summary: "The Bad Beginning" is just that.
Review: As a fan of the Harry Potter series, Roald Dahl, AND Charles Dickens, I approached this book on the recommendation of several friends who had read and enjoyed it-perhaps thinking I could enjoy the nine Lemony Snicket books while awaiting the fifth Harry Potter book like so many other H. P. fans. Trusting my friends and believing that "50,000 Harry Potter Fans Can't Be Wrong," I decided to give it a try. The notes on the back of the book clearly begin "I'm sorry to say that the book you are holding in your hands is extremely unpleasant." Truer words were never spoken! As many others here have pointed out (and even Lemony Snicket himself), there are no happy moments in this book. I understood this before reading it, but thought I might at least enjoy some of the "humor." I laughed once in 162 pages. The humor comes only when the reader can't see how circumstances for the Baudelaire kids could get any worse, and then they do. Perhaps it's unfair to compare this book to Harry Potter, for Harry Potter is everything this book isn't: clever, interesting, absorbing, exciting, well-written, and worthwhile. Snicket's characters are completely one-dimensional. Violet thinks about nothing other than inventing, Klaus is obsessed with reading, and Sunny exists only to babble nonsense words which are not-so-cleverly translated by the author. In addition to translating baby Sunny's words, the author also seems obliged to define every word over six letters-something that is cute and almost funny the first two times, but quickly becomes annoying when he does it on every other page. Besides the Baudelaire kids, we meet boring Mr. Poe: the manager of the kids' deceased parents' estate who never has time to address the kids' problems with their new guardian, Count Olaf. Olaf is pure evil; he drinks too much, abuses the children physically as well as emotionally, and devises an outlandish plot to grab the Baudelaire kids' inherited estate (I won't give it away, but can anyone imagine that such a plan would *actually* work!!??). Olaf's next-door neighbor is the amazingly thick-headed Justice Strauss, a judge who seems to live in her garden. She's kind to the kids, but can't detect that anything is wrong in the filthy, dilapidated house next to hers. Even when the kids explain their troubles to her and ask to look through her law books to figure out Olaf's "sneaky" plan, she doesn't bat an eye. And the kids still love her! I think Snicket underestimates the intelligence of his audience, not only by defining every other word (and I mean that figuratively, not literally...) but also by keeping the plot extremely simple, straightforward, and predictable. The Harry Potter series proved that kids can handle complex storylines and don't need to be spoon fed the meaning of any word with more than three syllables. Having said all this, I read the book in one sitting, something I don't usually do. I suppose my real reason for being unable to put the book down came from my expectation that at any moment, the storyline would "snap" and suddenly become interesting. Having read so many good reviews and heard so many positive things about this book, I was sure that with any turn of the page it would get better. All the way up to the bitter end (and it *is* a bitter end) I kept assuring myself that I would suddenly find myself "enjoying" the book. After all, I had had a similar experience with Harry Potter, in which I found the first twenty pages of the first book completely dull. Somewhere around the fourth chapter of H. P. though, I became hooked. That never happened with Lemony Snicket. Lemony Snicket is unique, and the idea of telling an unhappy, depressing story is a novel one, but I'm afraid the book doesn't live up to the hype. I'm usually easily pleased, but was thoroughly disappointed with "The Bad Beginning." In this case, you CAN judge a book by its cover.
Rating:
Summary: The Bad Beginning lives up to its name.
Review: Let's start out by saying that the only reason this book even got one star was because zero stars wasn't an option. I've read a LOT of children's books and this is far, far down on my list. The main problems with this book (and the whole series) is that the plot is dull, it's poorly written, there's no character development, you can't connect with any of the characters, it's depressing, and it's a teacher's worst nightmare if you value SHOW not TELL since the entire book reads like a plot summary. The appeal for these books is that they introduce vocabulary words, however what a waste of paper to do so in such an unimaginative way. There are so many books in this series, and it's probably because they only take about an hour each to churn out. The ONLY good thing about this book was that it was returnable. Let me plead, there are so many wonderful and creative children's books out there, DON'T WASTE YOUR TIME ON THIS TRASH!
Rating:
Summary: The Start of a Bad Thing
Review: Have you ever had that feeling that you are being watched or followed, when the hairs on the back of your neck shoot up like needles. This is what the Baudelaire orphans experince every where the go in their seemingly horrible lives. But befor we get ahead of our selves this is the beginning of a serise of unfortunate events where the man that is causeing this tension in the orphans life is reveled. A horriable man who will do ANYTHING to get his hands on the Baudelaire fortune wich was left to the orphans when their parents, house, and all of their belongings were lost in a terriable fire. This book is so great that anybody of any age can enjoy it and its pure cruelty towrads the Baudelaire orphans. When you are done with this book you will be thanking Lemony Snicket the author for writting eight other books in the series because this book will get you so hooked after reading it that you will want to get to the nearest bookstore as soon as possible to get the next book.
Rating:
Summary: Great start, cop-out ending
Review: I purchased this book for my 5 year old nephew. The story is very well written and even though bad things happen to these children one always senses they will overcome all the obstacles so it does not affect young children. It took a little coaxing but my nephew started getting into it about twenty pages in. The story was charming and the tension builds wonderfully. But the ending is such a cop-out. For a writer who claims to want to be realistic with children I was disappointed that he would choose such a fake ending. It killed it. Nevertheless my nephew enjoyed it and understood the story despite the big words. Maybe I'll get him the next one, see if it's better. It also has very few images (though they are fantastic), perhaps 5 or so in the whole book, something which my nephew would have liked to have seen more of, and perhaps would have helped captured his attention sooner.
Rating:
Summary: The Bad/Good Beginning
Review: I am a fifth grader who read this in fourth grade. This is a very good book and I read all books in this series except THE HOSTILE HOSPITAL AND THE CARNIVOROUS CARNIVAL. Also, THE SLIPPERY SLOPE which is coming out later. I don't want to give away the story but all the misery begins here. Be sure to read all the books in the series like me!
Rating:
Summary: The Bad/Good Beginning
Review: ... This is a very good book and I read all books in this series except THE HOSTILE HOSPITAL AND THE CARNIVOROUS CARNIVAL. Also, THE SLIPPERY SLOPE which is coming out later. I don't want to give away the story but all the misery begins here. Be sure to read all the books in the series like me!
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