Reviews with content warning for Physical abuse - The Bad Beginning

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Reviews tagging 'Physical abuse'

The Bad Beginning by Lemony Snicket

36 reviews

johannarose's review against another edition

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adventurous dark funny mysterious sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

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inkdrinkers's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

“If you have ever lost a loved one, then you know exactly how it feels. And if you have not, then you cannot possibly imagine it.”

One stormy day the Baudelaire children's' lives change in an instant. When they're approached by a family friend, Mr. Poe, and told their parents have perished (which here, means died) in a house fire, the children have no idea what their future holds. For Violet, Klaus, and Sunny, they hope it means a kind relative to take them in, help them with their grief, and give them a loving home - the reality is so much worse than you, or I, could imagine.

I remember reading this series when I was just a kid, spending most of my spare time in libraries and clutching books to my chest. I would take stacks and stacks of whatever I could find home - but this is one of those series that never quite left me. I feel like these definitely shaped me, in both my personality and vocabulary in my tween years. I decided to pick up the audio now, over a decade after my first read of them, just to see if they still held the same charm for me. And I'm happy to say, they really, really hold up.

One of the criticisms I see a lot of these books is that a lot of the language is too vague, or purposefully bizarre, but I really find a lot of charm in that. The way Handler (Snicket, in this case) chose to navigate a world that is both incredibly similar to our own but add spins that make it seem otherworldly has just concreted these books as classics, unable to quite feel dated when they're almost twenty years old. Of course, some of the content does date them, with the inclusion of character descriptions that border on transphobic, fatphobic, or otherwise - I still find it hard to fault The Bad Beginning specifically because so many of it's characters are caricatures of humans, themselves, and show both the worst and best parts of humanity.

Even as an adult the nausea holds up from the plot, Violet and the rest of her siblings go through horrific things in this novel and the author doesn't shy away from them. What's refreshing is, they're also addressed as being bad without boiling each instance down to a palatable lesson. Sometimes bad things happen because of bad people, sometimes bad things just happen, and it's almost comforting to know that a lot is just out of the character's control. I also think, particularly, this one has an iron-clad plot steeped in a lot of loopholes and twists that set up payoff for the next twelve books.

Honestly, if you were a fan as a child like I was, I would really consider picking up the audio to revisit these! Tim Curry does an incredible job as the narrator while they have children voicing the Baudelaires and various other actors for the other adults. It was a great audio to listen to and a short one!

Content warnings: child abuse (present throughout, no one treats these kids well), death of a parent (mentioned, not seen), grief, emotional and physical abuse (Olaf gaslights them, the other adults are stupid), fire (the parents die in a house fire off page), adult/minor relationship (the end plot hinges on Olaf's disgusting plan, though no romance happens)

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camelliagwerm's review against another edition

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dark mysterious fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Rereading this series as an adult makes you realise just how horrifying the experiences the Baudelaires face and just how much of it could have been avoided if Mr. Poe hadn't been so negligent.

Also: reading this alongside Tim Curry's reading makes Count Olaf that much scarier than he already was and the man deserves a Grammy for coughing up his lung as Mr. Poe.

CAWPILE rating: 9.29/10

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scruffie's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

I read this one in one go but I'm not sure how I feel about it now that I have. Curiosity certainly kept me going, but I found the story and the characters in it disturbing. Also it relies heavily on the trope of physical traits reflecting people's inner worth and qualities, which I don't like and find dangerous, in general. The explanations "—the word X here means Y—", though somewhat funny at first, were overused in my opinion, and lost their charm after the first few uses.

I'm curious enough to check out the next books, but I'm not as impressed as I'd hoped I'd be.

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