Book Review- A Series of Unfortunate Events #1-- The Bad Beginning

If you're between the ages of 12 and 32 and you haven't read this series, go read it. And if you're between the ages of 12 and 32 and you have read this series, go re-read it right now.

The Baudelaire children, Violet, Klaus, and Sunny, are all very intelligent and resourceful but very unlucky. Their parents die in a huge fire (which was maybe/definitely caused by arson) that destroyed their entire home. The executor of their estate is a banker named Mr. Poe who is completely incompetent. Honestly, it's hard to believe that this man is a professional. Anyway, Mr. Poe sends them to live with a man named Count Olaf, because apparently "closest living relative" means the one who lives closest to you geographically. Count Olaf is totally heinous and evil. His house is a pigsty and he is extremely neglectful and abusive toward the children. He's obsessed with getting his grimy hands on the Baudelaire fortune and goes to disgusting extremes to achieve this end. Basically he tries to force Violet to marry him but he gets outsmarted in an amazingly simple way.

Pretty much everything that happens in the book is completely stupid and doesn't make any sense. It's a great book because it's a metaphor for how sometimes life is completely stupid and doesn't make any sense. This entire series is actually a postmodern masterpiece that's way more digestible than a lot of other postmodern literature. It's full of moral ambiguity and really amusing literary references. And there's a mystery involving a secret organization. Strangely enough, I think I relate to the Baudelaire children more as an adult than I did as a child, and that's pretty cool.

4.5/5 stars