Kat with a K

Review: The Bad Beginning

The Bad Beginning by Lemony Snicket
Genre: Juvenile fantasy
Pages: 162
Rating: 3.1

This is the first volume of Lemony Snicket's enormously popular Series of Unfortunate Events; I had, of course, been aware of them for years, but never been terribly interested. I finally read this because my fifth grade book buddies wanted me to. When I started reading, my main response was "Oh, come ON" - I tend to have issues with narrative styles that are so deliberately cutesy. I eventually found myself drawn into the story, though. (For those who, like me, might have missed this phenomenon: it's about three siblings who are orphaned and face one awful happening after another until they manage to save themselves [until the next book] by their wits and ingenuity.) And it gets bonus points for presenting - and explaining - interesting vocabulary words, and for presenting a young female character who is a talented inventor and engineer.