Lemony Snicket Gift Pack - Nos.4-6 : "The Miserable Mill", "The Austere Academy", "The Ersatz Elevator"

A slipcase containing the CD editions of Books 4 -- 6 in the Series of Unfortunate Events. I hope that you have not chosen these CDs because you think they will provide the public with a pleasant listening experience.

If this is the case, you are much mistaken and I advise you to change you mind immediately. Off all the stories describing the unhappy lives of the Baudelaire orphans, The Miserable Mill might be the unhappiest yet.

Violet, Klaus and Sunny are sent to Paltryville to work in a lumbermill, where they find disaster and misfortune lurking behind every log, in the form of a giant pincher machine, a man with a cloud of smoke where his head should be, a hypnotist and a terrible accident resulting in injury. The Austere Academy is not a story about cheerful youngsters spending a jolly time at boarding school.

Violet, Klaus and Sunny are intelligent and resourceful children, and you might expect that they would do very well at school.

Don't. For the Baudelaires, school turns out to be another miserable episode in their unlucky lives, as they face snapping crabs, strict punishments, dripping fungus, comprehensive exams, violin recitals, and the metric system. Within the chapters of The Ersatz Elevator, the Baudelaire orphans encounter a darkened staircase, a red herring, three mysterious initials, a liar with an evil scheme, a secret passageway and parsley soda!

In short nothing but misery, despair and discomfort. It is our duty to stay to produce these CDs recording the history of the three hapless young orphans, so the general public will know each terrible thing that has happened to them, but you may be more comfortable getting a good night's sleep.

In that case, you should probably choose some other CD to save yourself from a heapful of horror and woe.