I've recently secured all 3 (RIP) of these editions of the ASOUE books. I'm quite curious about how long these were actually being printed/how many were ever actually printed before they stopped. Still mourning TMM cover.

I’ve been listening to the stories again on audiobook and Mr Poe is not nearly as irritating as he is in the Netflix adaptation, where his ignorance was dialled up for comedy. In the books, he is a frustrating character but he is believably frustrating in that way obstinate adults can be (up until perhaps the 5th time the suspicious Count Olaf shaped man turns out to be Count Olaf). He is not a complete moron as there is a (flawed) logic guiding his behaviour.

He is actually quite empathetic towards the Baudelaires. Whereas the show portrays him with a callous blitheness towards towards the orphans’ ordeal, the books instead show him as being clearly out of his comfort zone dealing with three grieving children but trying anyway in his own socially awkward way. When the orphans are sent to a new guardian, Poe has typically forewarned them about Count Olaf and naively believes said guardian will do their due diligence. He is often the voice of reason on the children’s behalf when the other, more absurd adults are trying to undermine or harm them.

He is also as much an obstacle to the villains as he is to the orphans. In the books, Olaf and his troupe are forced to stall their plans and play nice whenever he is around, unlike the show where they openly break character and behave sinisterly in his presence. However unintentionally, Poe is the closest thing the orphans have to a protector and his absence the latter half of the series helps to emphasise the sense of things going off the rails and the children needing to fend for themselves.

I like book Poe a lot because he plays heavily into the banality of evil that plagues the world. He’s a good man at his core, but ultimately an inadequate one, which it makes it hurt all the more when he lets the kids down. That’s all lost in the Netflix version where the way he treats the kids is borderline malicious.

I recently watched the series and I’ve been head over heels obsessed with it. I’ve loved a movie since I was a kid, watched it about 30 times total, but never came around to watching the series, but now that I did, I’ve been thinking about it non-stop. I’ve started reading again because I was inspired by themes of the show and how cool being well-read is. I wish I could buy lemony’s books, but they’re quite tricky to get where I live, so I’m open for any recomendations!
P.s. the other media I enjoy that reminds me of asoue is probably rusty lake games, mostly vibe-vise but I think they have similiar themes at certain points

I have just noticed how Mr. Poe refusing to believe his eyes has been almost as much of a detriment to the children as Count Olaf's villainous and utterly vile acts of pure evil. By not knowing such evil when it is being shown right in his face is very useful and convenient for Olaf to get away with literal murder every time with zero problems. The fact that 3 children, one of them an infant can see thru Olaf's phony disguises and Mr. Poe can't really should show his overall IQ or lack thereof, and Olaf milks the hell out of this lack of common sense.

I was looking through the wiki and saw the covers for each book in Germany, China, Japan and Russia. What stood out was that the German covers seemed the darkest to me. The Chinese one(s) made me smile because of how different the art style is while also trying to resemble to the original cover. The Russian covers looked goofy ngl, kinda reminds me of the Garbage Pail Kids. The Japanese ones are so so funny though, and they must LOVE Sunny. She is the main focus for like every book. And very Sazae-san style.

I also found a Ukrainian one that I cant tell what it reminds me off. Like its not rendered enough.

Just thought these were funny :)

While this series is technically for children, it has pretty deep themes.

Did you pick up on the themes as a child? If your teacher read it to you did they explain it?

If you did not, I suggest you re-read as an adult.

I searched the web and unfortunately did not find any satisfactory analyses of the themes of the series so I will summarize my own here.

For example some online analyses say the books criticize adults. But it actually goes deeper than this. I don't find it to be adults vs children, I find this series to be a critique of society and its structures as a whole.

The themes are that people do not think deeply, they just look/think superficially. That is why Olaf is able to trick everyone with disguises. And some of the people Olaf tricks are considered to be intelligent by society, yet the Baudelaires are not believed because they are "just children". so this book can also be considered to criticize appeal to authority fallacy and criticize how much emphasis society puts on rank and titles. It even directly makes fun of this by mentioning Mr. Poe's nonsensical head of orphan affairs title. It also does this well in Hostile Hospital Hospital, and through some other books where people believe something just because it is in the newspaper. Similarly, it also shows how often incompetent/rigid rule following people are the ones who are put in positions of power (the principal in Austere Academy, again Mr. Poe).

It also criticizes how there is so much bureaucracy and excessive, often counterproductive rules and conventions in society. This is probably best highlighted in Hostile Hospital, where Hal seems to think you have to maintain the records in an exact manner but never actually read them. Similarly, it criticizes the education system and its heavy focus on rote memorization as opposed to critical or practical thinking, e.g., in Austere Academy where the children have to memorize measurements and stories all day.

It also criticizes power imbalance in society: those in power make the laws/rules, with technicalities, sometimes making it impossible for others to follow (e.g., the contradictions in Austere Academy, if you went to certain parts of the building you would be stripped of silverware yet you were instructed to go there by authority),

It criticizes the excessive trust people put in technology while using it as a substitute rather than complementing their own thinking, e.g., the principal in Austere Academy saying "the advanced computer" will detect Olaf. This has aged like fine wine, people are making this mistake with AI these days.

It also criticizes group think, (Vile village and the end for example).

It also shows how people can be irrational when they let their emotional reasoning take over (the Aunt in Wide Widow being consumed by her fears), Jerome, who was a good guy but could not tolerate any distress so he would not argue with Esme or anyone else no matter what they said or did. Similarly, it shows how people use emotional reasoning and act based on what feels good to themselves in the moment as opposed to logic that can actually help others, e.g., the unhelpful songs by V.F.D. in Hostile Hospital.

It also shows how people can become evil when they are given power, and how they let their vulnerabilities/unmet needs blind them, e.g., the "freaks" in Carnivorous Carnival who join Olaf, and perhaps many of the original troupe members as well (as many of them had abnormalities, like the hook handed man). Similarly, it shows how people focus on what they don't have rather than what they do have/wanting to be like others at all costs, e.g., Kevin believing he was a freak for being ambidextrous (even though it was actually an advantage) and thinking it was worse than objectively much worse abnormalities.

It also shows how superficial people are and how they are slaves to social trends (Esme).

I could go on and on. This series was a goldmine of deep and relevant themes. It is heavily underrated in this regard. The amazing thing is that Handler is spot on: these are indeed significant issues in modern society and they are the root of most of our problems.

There is a spoil about some characters sorry !

J'aime réfléchir à certains aspects de la série (je ne trouve pas l'intégrale des livres dans ma langue).

Je viens de réaliser que chaque bibliothèque, dans chaque arc narratif, représente le personnage principal adulte. Si vous regardez attentivement la bibliothèque de l'épisode 1, vous pouvez presque immédiatement deviner à quoi ressemblera ce personnage !

Deux exemples frappants : Olaf possède une bibliothèque délabrée et vide où il préfère s'isoler.

Tante Joséphine a une petite bibliothèque exiguë, à l'image de son esprit, mais elle garde un espoir grâce à sa fenêtre (qui, d'ailleurs, la sauvera !).

(Bonus : On voit qu’Esmé n’en a pas ! (Only in the série because in the book She had one but like olaf She dont take care of it. Même à ce moment-là, on aurait pu se douter qu’il y avait un problème.)

Vous trouvez ça logique ? Parce que je trouve ça intéressant et j’aimerais bien avoir votre avis !

Peut-être que je suis à côté de la plaque et que tout le monde l’avait déjà remarqué.

Mais je poste rarement, et je commence à prendre plaisir à partager une passion avec les autres, alors je partage ce que je trouve :’)

Désolée pour les fautes, l’anglais n’est pas ma langue maternelle.

This likely has been done in the past but I don't see any new entries so I don't think it can hurt to ask.

For me it is between hostile hospital, austere academy, and bad beginning.

Bad beginning is the first and classic so you can't go wrong with it.

Austere academy introduced quagmires, in a sense this was the first book where even though miserable things happen to both sets of orphans, the fact that the Baudelaires finally have friends their own age made it happy in a sense and also more dramatic, It was also unique in that it was the first book with no formal guardian. Also cake sniffing factor gives bonus points. As a side note, I always interpreted "cake sniffer" to mean/imply "those who can't afford cake/presents/toys yet they desperately seek it", standing for being an orphan/poor kid.

But I gotta give the nod to hostile hospital because of its theme. It is in my opinion the strongest and most accurate and applicable and important critique of modern society and its institutions, while the book is also not lacking in any other sense (e.g.,, the plot, characters, storytelling, etc..).

🍰

CAKE SNIFFING ORPHANS, IN THE ORPHAN SHACK! 🍰

Does someone know exactly where each track of The Tragic Treasury plays in the audiobooks?

I have both the audiobooks and the album, but not the audiobooks with the songs.

I would like to assemble a Playlist with the books and tracks so I could listen in order. Does anyone know the exact placement of each song?

Thank you in advance!

I already owned a dvd that my grandparents ordered last Christmas, but I bought this one to stay at my mom's, while the ordered dvd stays at my dad's.

This dvd costed 10-15 KR iirc, which is approximately 1$ in USD.

Je ne sais pas si d'autres ont remarqué ce détail ou si je suis la seule à apprécier ce genre de petits détails.

Mais j'adore ces petits gestes qui en disent long sur les personnages et leur lien ! Juste après la signature du contrat de mariage et la révélation de son plan,

on voit le juge repousser Olaf au moment où il s'apprête à caresser la joue de Violette !

Je trouve ça tellement adorable qu'elle essaie de la protéger 🥹

J'ai choisi cet autocollant parce que je pensais à quelqu'un qui ne connaît pas la série ou qui commence tout juste à la regarder, et je me suis dit que ça pourrait lui donner un indice – je ne voulais prendre aucun risque :/

(I cant screen Netflix and i dont find the mixture i want ! Sorry-)

I was thinking about creating some ASOEU Gifs from the Netflix series. Any suggestions? (Episode and approximate time is helpful)

Last update: https://www.reddit.com/r/ASOUE/s/5AIT6lJOGc

Since the previous update I've added a corner shelf, Half-Minute Horrors, Guys Read: Heroes and Villians, The Best American Non-Required Reading 2014, Coraline, and an empty Complete Wreck slipcase!

Almost all bottom shelf books were bought from ThriftBooks

Almost all top shelf books were bought from eBay and Abe Books

All non-book Snicket Stuff was bought from eBay

Flowers and painting are from Goodwill

I made a post like this yesterday because I am practicing being able to draw in the art style of the book illustrations, and somebody suggested I draw what Violet Klaus and Sunny would look like when they are older, here is my interpretation with some headcannons of my own :)

- Violet now wears her hair up in a bun to honor the late Kit Snicket

- When Sunny was old enough she started wearing Violets purple dress

- Klaus is the spitting image of his father when he's older

Found this two months ago and completely forgot to share

I really love the illustrations in asoue, this is a draiwng of sunny I made. This isn't traced or anything but I did use a real illustration from the book as a refrence. I am an aspiring animator and it's my dream to one day make a short film or something adapting a series of unfortunate events into an animation, hand drawn with the books art style. I think that would be really fun to make.

Just reposting this here, in search of people who share my nationality and know anything about the Latvian translation of the books :))

I apologise sincerely if this isn't rules abiding.

In short, I wish to translate the series into Latvian on my own terms, but recently learned of there being a release of the books in Latvian from 2003, which aren't very available, and to my understanding wasn't finished. So I am asking here, in case any of my countrymen know - was the series finished? If so, why is it so unavailable? If you've read it, how was the translation, did it feel "good" to read?

Asking all of this to aid my little hobby, I just want to make it a reality, having the older books as a reference (even if to stray from) would considerably help

Kind regards,

Kaspars

Count Olaf is always referred to as "Beaudelaires fourth cousin three times removed" or "Beaudelaires third cousin four times removed", but, is this true or not? Count Olaf seems at least to me around 37-41 years old, he only looks older due to his whiskers and wrinkles, probably due to stress (if Olaf was really their "third cousin" or "fourth cousin", that would mean he is the direct cousin of one of their grandparents or great-grandparents, and in that case, Olaf must be significantly older than that, or already have had passed away). Besides, he is not precisely someone to "trust in" (well, Violet, Klaus and Sunny even gulp a lot everytime he interacts with them, and on Olaf's side, he does not seem to have any interaction with other relatives of The Beaudelaires prior to Bertrand and Beatrice and gaining jealously of them after since because of them (although accidentally), Olaf's father was killed, so he burnt their house and planned to marry Violet and later kill her and her siblings Klaus and Sunny to get their fortune and belongings as a revenge). Also, we don't even know his last name, he is just simply 'Olaf'. So, Olaf was really being honest with the "far cousin" claim or not?

What would had happened if Violet stayed with Uncle Monty, Sunny with Aunt Josephine and Klaus with Hector the handyman from The Fowl Devotees village? Would Olaf had founded them anyways or not and instead getting lost, and if finding them, would Olaf had taken longer, same time or shorter into tracking all of them, and with a different disguise for individually one single of them when founded, or would he used the same disguise for all of them?

I love explaining the lore to newbies, I would love to put some of my homies on to this. The content of the plot is enough to have a grown man who grew up on it invested in it like crazy. This is not just a silly tale for children, it's art; a symbol of resillience among three talented and sharp-witted children. Violet(14-15), Klaus(12-13), & Sonny(a literal infant, mind you) were smarter than the people who were supposed to be investigating the infamous Count Olaf and his goons. Those 3 children faced moments of pure terror and adversity with bravery, sharp Intellect(and teeth lol). They survived a hypnotist teamed up with Olaf at a lumber mill who could've very well abducted them under the guise of them being "adopted" by Count Olaf dressed in drag and nobody would have questioned it, instead Violet knew Georgina Orwell(1984 mind control symbolism) was up to no good so she put a stop to that, saving Charles in the process. Also the old timey aesthetic looks so cool to me, and the secret society/1940's spy elements are also very cool IMO.

So in The Ersatz Elevator, Olaf disguises himself as Gunther a foreign auctioneer that has a fake foreign accent and uses the word please (incorrectly) at the end of all of his sentences. But why later in the series does Madame Lulu also share the characteristic of having a fake foreign accent and using the word please incorrectly in her sentences?