β
Just because you don't understand it doesn't mean it isn't so.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Blank Book (A Series of Unfortunate Events))
β
It is very unnerving to be proven wrong, particularly when you are really right and the person who is really wrong is proving you wrong and proving himself, wrongly, right.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Blank Book (A Series of Unfortunate Events))
β
To hear the phrase "our only hope" always makes one anxious, because it means that if the only hope doesn't work, there is nothing left.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Blank Book (A Series of Unfortunate Events))
β
The key to good eavesdropping is not getting caught.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Blank Book (A Series of Unfortunate Events))
β
People don't always get what they deserve in this world.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Blank Book (A Series of Unfortunate Events))
β
They're book addicts.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Miserable Mill (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #4))
β
Oftentimes. when people are miserable, they will want to make other people miserable, too. But it never helps.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Blank Book (A Series of Unfortunate Events))
β
Morning is an important time of day, because how you spend your morning can often tell you what kind of day you are going to have.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Blank Book (A Series of Unfortunate Events))
β
It is terribly rude to tell people that their troubles are boring.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Blank Book (A Series of Unfortunate Events))
β
There are many, many types of books in the world, which makes good sense, because there are many, many types of people, and everybody wants to read something different.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #1))
β
Just because something is traditional is no reason to do it, of course.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Blank Book (A Series of Unfortunate Events))
β
There are few sights sadder than a ruined book.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Wide Window (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #3))
β
A new experience can be extremely pleasurable, or extremely irritating, or somewhere in between, and you never know until you try it out.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Blank Book (A Series of Unfortunate Events))
β
Criminals should be punished, not fed pastries.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Blank Book (A Series of Unfortunate Events))
β
Like a church bell, a coffin, and a vat of melted chocolate, a supply closet is rarely a comfortable place to hide.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Blank Book (A Series of Unfortunate Events))
β
The book was long, and difficult to read, and Klaus became more and more tired as the night wore on. Occasionally his eyes would close. He found himself reading the same sentence over and over. He found himself reading the same sentence over and over. He found himself reading the same sentence over and over.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #1))
β
The burning of a book is a sad, sad sight, for even though a book is nothing but ink and paper, it feels as if the ideas contained in the book are disappearing as the pages turn to ashes and the cover and binding--which is the term for the stitching and glue that holds the pages together--blacken and curl as the flames do their wicked work. When someone is burning a book, they are showing utter contempt for all of the thinking that produced its ideas, all of the labor that went into its words and sentences, and all of the trouble that befell the author . . .
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Penultimate Peril (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #12))
β
Just because something is typed-whether it is typed on a business card or typed in a newspaper or book-this does not mean that it is true.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Wide Window (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #3))
β
Whenever you are examining someone else's belongings, you are bound to learn many interesting things about the person of which you were not previously aware.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Blank Book (A Series of Unfortunate Events))
β
If you feel . . . that well-read people are less likely to be evil, and a world full of people sitting quietly with good books in their hands is preferable to world filled with schisms and sirens and other noisy and troublesome things, then every time you enter a library you might say to yourself, 'The world is quiet here,' as a sort of pledge proclaiming reading to be the greater good.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Slippery Slope (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #10))
β
But one type of book that practically no one likes to read is a book about the law. Books about the law are notorious for being very long, very dull, and very difficult to read. This is one reason many lawyers make heaps of money. The money is an incentive - the word "incentive" here means "an offered reward to persuade you to do something you don't want to do - to read long, dull, and difficult books.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #1))
β
In this book, not only is there no happy ending, there is no happy beginning and very few happy things in the middle.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #1))
β
Every time you enter a library you might say to yourself, "The world is quiet here," as a sort of pledge proclaiming reading to be the greater good.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Slippery Slope (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #10))
β
You may want to keep a commonplace book which is a notebook where you can copy parts of books you think are in code, or take notes on a series of events you may have observed that are suspicious, unfortunate, or very dull. Keep your commonplace book in a safe place, such as underneath your bed, or at a nearby dairy.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (Lemony Snicket: The Unauthorized Autobiography)
β
All his life, Klaus had believed that if you read enough books, you could solve any problem, but now he wasn't so sure.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #1))
β
Sometimes words are not enough. There are some circumstances so utterly wretched that I cannot describe them in sentences or paragraphs or even a whole series of books.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Ersatz Elevator (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #6))
β
Normally I don't approve of children staying up late,' he said finally, 'unless they are reading a very good book, seeing a wonderful movie, or attending a dinner party with fascinating guests.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Vile Village (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #7))
β
The central theme of Anna Karenina," he said, "is that a rural life of moral simplicity, despite its monotony, is the preferable personal narrative to a daring life of impulsive passion, which only leads to tragedy."
"That is a very long theme," the scout said.
"It's a very long book," Klaus replied.
[...]
"Or maybe a daring life of impulsive passion leads to something else," the scout said, and in some cases this mysterious person was right. A daring life of impulsive passion is an expression which refers to people who follow what is in their hearts, and like people who prefer to follow their head, or follow a mysterious man in a dark blue raincoat, people who lead a daring life of impulsive passion end up doing all sorts of things.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Slippery Slope (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #10))
β
Read about things that wouldn't keep you up all night long, weeping and tearing out your hair.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Ersatz Elevator (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #6))
β
Sometime during your lifeβin fact, very soonβyou may find yourself reading a book, and you may notice that a bookβs first sentence can often tell you what sort of story your book contains.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Miserable Mill (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #4))
β
Klaus sighed, and opened a book, and as at so many other times when the middle Baudelaire child did not want to think about his circumstances, he began to read.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Reptile Room (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #2))
β
What a schmuck!
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #1))
β
..no matter how much one reads, the whole story can never be told.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The End (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #13))
β
If you are interested in stories with happy endings, you would be better off reading some other books. In this book, not only is there no happy ending, there is no happy beginning and very few happy things in the middle.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #1))
β
It made the Baudelaire sisters a little sad to see all those books sitting in the library unread and unnoticed, like stray dogs or lost children that nobody wanted to take home.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Ersatz Elevator (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #6))
β
There are few sights sadder than a ruined book, but Klaus had no time to be sad.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Wide Window (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #3))
β
Never trust anyone without a book.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Wide Window (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #3))
β
Like this book, the dictionary shows you that the word "nervous" means "worried about something" -- you might feel nervous, for instance, if you were served prune ice cream for dessert, because you would be worried that it would taste awful -- whereas the word "anxious" means "troubled by disturbing suspense," which you might feel if you were served a live alligator for dessert, because you would be troubled by the disturbing suspense about whether you would eat your dessert or it would eat you.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Ersatz Elevator (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #6))
β
As I'm sure you know, a good night's sleep helps you perform well in school, and so if you are a student you should always get a good night's sleep unless you have come to the good part of your book, and then you should stay up all night and let your schoolwork fall by the wayside, a phrase which here means 'flunk.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Austere Academy (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #5))
β
Klaus grinned. 'I'm sorry,' he said, 'but it was a very interesting book, and I'm so pleased that it's coming in handy.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Miserable Mill (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #4))
β
But unlike this book, the dictionary also discusses words that are far more pleasant to contemplate. The word 'bubble' is in the dictionary, for instance, as is the word 'peacock,' the word 'vacation,' and the words 'the' 'author's' 'execution' 'has' 'been' 'canceled,' which makes a sentence that is always pleasant to hear.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Ersatz Elevator (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #6))
β
When you read as many books as Klaus Baudelaire, you are going to learn a great deal of information that might not become useful for a long time. You might read a book that would teach you all about the exploration of outer space, even if you do not become an astronaut until you are eighty years old. You might read a book about how to preform tricks on ice skates, and then not be forced to preform these tricks for a few weeks. You might read a book on how to have a successful marriage, when the only women you will ever love has married someone else and then perished one terrible afternoon.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Hostile Hospital (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #8))
β
Count Olaf had taken out a bottle of wine to pour himself some breakfast, but when he saw the book he stopped, and sat down.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #1))
β
If you are interested in stories with happy endings, you would be better off reading some other book.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #1))
β
If you have ever peeled an onion, then you know that the first thin, papery layer reveals another thin, papery layer, and that layer reveals another, and another, and before you know it you have hundreds of layers all over the kitchen table and thousands of tears in your eyes, sorry that you ever started peeling in the first place and wishing that you had left the onion alone to wither away on the shelf of the pantry while you went on with your life, even if that meant never again enjoying the complicated and overwhelming taste of this strange and bitter vegetable.
In this way, the story of the Baudelaire orphans is like an onion, and if you insist on reading each and every thin, papery layer in A Series of Unfortunate Events, your only reward will be 170 chapters of misery in your library and countless tears in your eyes. Even if you have read the first twelve volumes of the Baudelaires' story, it is not too late to stop peeling away the layers, and to put this book back on the shelf to wither away while you read something less complicated and overwhelming. The end of this unhappy chronicle is like its bad beginning, as each misfortune only reveals another, and another, and another, and only those with the stomach for this strange and bitter tale should venture any farther into the Baudelaire onion. I'm sorry to tell you this, but that is how the story goes.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The End (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #13))
β
Business cards, of course, are not proof of anything. Anyone can go to a print shop and have cards made that say anything they like. The king of Denmark can order business cards that say he sells golf balls. Your dentist can order business cards that say she is your grandmother. In order to escape from the castle of an enemy of mine, I once had cards printed that said I was an admiral in the French navy. Just because something is typed - whether it is typed on a business card or typed in a newspaper or book - this does not mean it is true.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Wide Window (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #3))
β
These brats know a lot of words,' Shirley said, in her ridiculously fake high voice. 'They're book addicts. But we can still create an accident and win the fortune!
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Miserable Mill (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #4))
β
Just because something is typedβwhether it is typed on a business card or typed in a newspaper or bookβthis does not mean that it is true.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (A Series of Unfortunate Events Complete Collection: Books 1-13: With Bonus Material)
β
Some believe that everyone is born with a moral compass already inside them, like an appendix, or a fear of worms. Others believe that a moral compass develops over time, as a person learns about the decisions of others by observing the world and reading books. In any case, a moral compass appears to be a delicate device, and as people grow older and venture out into the world it often becomes more and more difficult to figure out which direction one's moral compass is pointing, so it is harder and harder to figure out the proper thing to do.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The End (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #13))
β
The room was a library. Not a public library, but a private library; that is, a collection of books belonging to Justice Strauss. There were shelves and shelves of them, on every wall from the floor to the ceiling, and separate shelves of them in the middle of the room. The only place were there weren't books was in one corner, where there were some large, comfortable-looking chairs and a wooden table with lamps hanging over them, perfect for reading. Although it was not as big as their parents library, it was cozy, and the Baudelaire children were thrilled.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #1))
β
And still other people think that destiny is an invisible force, like gravity, or a fear of paper cuts, that guides everyone throughout their lives, whether they are embarking on a mysterious errand, doing a treacherous deed, or deciding that a book they have begun reading is too dreadful to finish.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Penultimate Peril (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #12))
β
Page thirteen of the Baudelaire file was not a crowded sheet of paper - there was just one photography and a sentence to make an author cry himself to sleep even years after the photograph was taken, or to make three siblings sit and stare at a page for a long time, as if an entire book were printed on one sheet of paper.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Hostile Hospital (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #8))
β
At this point in the story, I feel obliged to interrupt and give you one last warning. As I said at the very beginning, the book you are holding in your hands does not have a happy ending. It may appear now that Count Olaf will go to jail and that the three Baudelaire youngsters will live happily ever after with Justice Strauss, but it is not so. If you like, you may shut the book this instant and not read the unhappy ending that is to follow. You may spend the rest of your life believing that the Baudelaires triumphed over Count Olaf and lived the rest of their lives in the house and library of Justice Strauss, but that is not how the story goes.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #1))
β
Just because something is typed - whether it is typed on a business card or typed in a newspaper or book - this does not mean that it is true.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Wide Window (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #3))
β
Grinning is something you do when you are entertained in some way, such as reading a good book or watching someone you donβt care for spill orange soda all over himself.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Vile Village (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #7))
β
Klaus had not told his siblings about the book, because he didn't want to give them false hope.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #1))
β
For sapphires we are held in here. Only you can end our fear.β Violet said. βUntil dawn comes we cannot speak. No words can come from this sad beak.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (A Series of Unfortunate Events Complete Collection: Books 1-13: With Bonus Material)
β
But there are things that are difficult to see not because of the size of their surroundings, or a clever disguise, or a treacherous person with a book of matches in his pocket and a fiendish plot in his brain, but because the things are so upsetting to look at, so distressing to believe, that it is as if your eyes refuse to see what is right in front of them.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Grim Grotto (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #11))
β
Being only twelve, Klaus of course had not read all the books in the Baudelaire library, but he had read a great many of them and had retained a lot of the information from his readings. He knew how to tell an alligator from a crocodile. He knew who killed Julius Caesar. And he knew much about the tiny, slimy animals found at Briny Beach, which he was examining now.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #1))
β
If this were a book written to entertain small children, you would know what would happen next. With the villain's identity and evil plans exposed, the police would arrive on the scene and place him in a jail for the rest of his life, and the plucky youngsters would go out for pizza and live happily ever after. But this book is about the Baudelaire orphans, and you and I know that these three unfortunate children living happily ever after is about as likely as Uncle Monty returning to life.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Reptile Room (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #2))
β
It is much, much worse to receive bad news through the written word than by somebody simply telling you, and Iβm sure you understand why. When somebody simply tells you bad news, you hear it once, and thatβs the end of it. But when bad news is written down, whether in a letter or a newspaper or on your arm in felt tip pen, each time you read it, you feel as if you are receiving the news again and again. For instance, I once loved a woman, who for various reasons could not marry me. If she had simply told me in person, I would have been very sad, of course, but eventually it might have passed. However, she chose instead to write a two-hundred-page book, explaining every single detail of the bad news at great length, and instead my sadness has been of impossible depth. When the book was first brought to me, by a flock of carrier pigeons, I stayed up all night reading it, and I read it still, over and over, and it is as if my darling Beatrice is bringing me bad news every day and every night of my life. The Baudelaire orphans
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Miserable Mill (A Series of Unfortunate Events #4))
β
Whenever you see the words 'hee hee hee' in a book, or 'ha ha ha,' or 'har har har,' or 'heh heh heh,' or even 'ho ho ho,' those words mean somebody was laughing. In the case, however, the words 'hee hee hee' cannot really describe what Vice Principal Nero's laugh sounded like. The laugh was squeaky, and it was wheezy, and it had a rough crackly edge to it, as if Nero were eating tin cans and he laughed at the children. But most of all the laugh sounded cruel.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Austere Academy (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #5))
β
The burning of a book is a sad, sad sight, for even though a book is nothing but ink and paper, it feels as if the ideas contained in the book are disappearing as the pages turn to ashes and the cover and binding blacken and curl as the flames do their wicked work.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Penultimate Peril (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #12))
β
Where are the books? All these elegant bookshelves are empty.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Miserable Mill (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #4))
β
trivial as her hair. This morning she was thinking about how to construct
β
β
Lemony Snicket (A Series of Unfortunate Events Complete Collection: Books 1-13: With Bonus Material)
β
a triumphant grin on his face, dressed in a familiar suit made of slippery-looking material, but with a portrait of another author whom only a very devoted reader would recognize,
β
β
Lemony Snicket (A Series of Unfortunate Events Collection: Books 10-13 (A Series of Unfortunate Events Boxset Book 4))
β
Just because something is typedβwhether it is typed on a business card or typed in a newspaper or bookβthis does not mean that it is true. The
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Wide Window (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #3))
β
Whether you have been sent to see the principle of your school for throwing wet paper towels at the ceiling to see if they stick or taken to the dentist to plead with him to hollow out one of your teeth so you can smuggle a single page of your latest book past the guards at the airport, it is never a pleasant feeling to stand outside the door of an office....
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Hostile Hospital (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #8))
β
There are many, many types of books in the world, which makes good sense, because there are many, many types of people, and everybody wants to read something diferent. For instance, people who hate stories in which terrible things happen to small children should put this book down immediately. But one type of book that practically no one likes to read is a book about the law. Books about the law are notorious for being very long, very dull, and very difficult to read. This is one reason many lawyers make heaps of money. The money is an incentive - the word "incentive" here means "an offered reward to persuade you to do something you don't want to do" - to read long, dull, and difficult books.
The Baudelaire children had a slightly different incentive for reading these books, of course. Their incentive was not heaps of money, but preventing Count Olaf from doing something horrible to them in order to get heaps of money. But even with this incentive, getting through the law books in Justice Strauss's private library was a very, very, very hard task.
"Goodness," Justice Strauss said, when she came into the library and saw what they were reading. [...] "I thought you were interested in mechanical engineering, animals of North America, and teeth. Are you sure you want to read those enormous law books? Even I don't like reading them, and I work in law.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #1))
β
The good people who are publishing this book have a concern that they have expressed to me. The concern is that readers like yourself will read my history of the Baudelaire orphans and attempt to imitate some of the things they do. So at this point in the story, in order to mollify the publishers - the word 'mollify' here means 'get them to stop tearing their hair out in worry' - please allow me to give you a piece of advice, even though I don't know anything about you. The piece of advice is as follows: If you ever need to get to Curdled Cave in a hurry, do not, under any circumstances, steal a boat and attempt to sail across Lake Lachrymose during a hurricane, because it is very dangerous and the chance of your survival are practically zero.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Wide Window (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #3))
β
The library turned out to be a very pleasant place, but it was not the comfortable chairs, the huge wooden bookshelves, or the hush of people reading that made the three siblings feel so good as they walked into the room. It is useless for me to tell you all about the brass lamps in the shapes of different fish, or the bright blue curtains that rippled like water as a breeze came in from the window, because although these were wonderful things they were no what made the three children smile. The Quagmire triplets were smiling, too, and although I have not researched the Quagmires nearly as much as I have the Baudelaires, I can say with reasonable accuracy that they were smiling for the same reason.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Austere Academy (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #5))
β
There are many different things in this world to hide, but a secret is not one of them. It is difficult to hide an airplane, for instance, because you generally need to find a deep hole or an enormous haystack, and sneak the airplane inside in the middle of the night, but it is easy to hide a secret about an airplane, because you can merely write it on a tiny piece of paper and tape it to the bottom of your mattress any time you are at home. It is difficult to hide a symphony orchestra, because you usually need to rent a soundproof room and borrow as many sleeping bags as you can find, but it is easy to hide a secret about a symphony orchestra, because you can merely whisper it into the ear of a trustworthy friend or music critic. And it is difficult to hind yourself, because you sometimes need to stuff yourself into the trunk of an automobile, or concoct a disguise out of whatever you can find, but it is easy to hide a secret about yourself because you can merely type it into a book and hope it falls into the right hands. My dear sister, if you are reading things I am still alive, and heading north to try and find you.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Carnivorous Carnival (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #9))
β
I lost Ike,' Aunt Josephine said, 'and I lost Lake Lachrymose. I mean, I didn't really lose it, of course. It's still down in the valley. But I grew up on its shores. I used to swim in it every day. I know which beaches were sandy and which were rocky. I knew all the islands in the middle of its waters and all the caves alongside it's shore. Lake Lachrymose felt like a friend to me. But when it took poor Ike away from me I was too afraid to go near it anymore. I stopped swimming in it. I never went to the beach again. I even put away all my books about it. The only way I can bear to look at it is from the Wide Window in the Library.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Wide Window (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #3))
β
If you are interested in stories with happy endings, you would be better off reading some other book. In this book, not only is there no happy ending, there is no happy beginning and very few happy things in the middle.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (A Series of Unfortunate Events Complete Collection: Books 1-13: With Bonus Material)
β
I once threw myself down a flight of stairs rather than face even one moment with a milliner, at whose shop I quit working after discovering the sinister truth about her berets, only to find that the paramedic who repaired my fractured arm was a man who had fired me from a job playing accordion in his orchestra after only two and half performances of a certain opera.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (A Series of Unfortunate Events Collection: Books 10-13 (A Series of Unfortunate Events Boxset Book 4))
β
As Iβm sure you know, a good nightβs sleep helps you perform well in school, and so if you are a student you should always get a good nightβs sleep unless you have come to the good part of your book, and then you should stay up all night and let your schoolwork fall by the wayside, a phrase which means βflunk.β In
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Austere Academy (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #5))
β
There are many, many types of books in the world, which makes good sense, because there are many, many types of people, and everybody wants to read something different. For instance, people who hate stories in which terrible things happen to small children should put this book down immediately. But one type of book that practically no one likes to read is a book about the law. Books about the law are notorious for being very long, very dull, and very difficult to read. This is one reason many lawyers make heaps of money. The money is an incentiveβthe word βincentiveβ here means βan offered reward to persuade you to do something you donβt want to doββto read long, dull, and difficult books.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #1))
β
Deciding on the right thing to do in a situation is a bit like deciding on the right thing to wear to a party. It is easy to decide on what is wrong to wear to a party, such as deep-sea diving equipment or a pair of large pillows, but deciding what is right is much trickier. It might seem right to wear a navy blue suit, for instance, but when you arrive there could be several other people wearing the same thing, and you could end up being handcuffed due to a case of mistaken identity. It might seem right to wear your favorite pair of shoes, but there could be a sudden flood at the party, and your shoes would be ruined. And it might seem right to wear a suit of armor to the party, but there could be several other people wearing the same thing, and you could end up being caught in a flood due to a case of mistaken identity, and find yourself drifting out to sea wishing that you were wearing deep-sea diving equipment after all. The truth is that you can never be sure if you have decided on the right thing until the party is over, and by then it is too late to go back and change your mind, which is why the world is filled with people doing terrible things and wearing ugly clothing, and so few volunteers who are able to stop them.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (A Series of Unfortunate Events Complete Collection: Books 1-13: With Bonus Material)
β
after they had been reunited with their baby sister and learned the secret of Verbal Fridge Dialogue. And
β
β
Lemony Snicket (A Series of Unfortunate Events Collection: Books 10-13 (A Series of Unfortunate Events Boxset Book 4))
β
two things that should be avoided at all costs,
β
β
Lemony Snicket (A Series of Unfortunate Events Collection: Books 4-6 (A Series of Unfortunate Events Boxset Book 2))
β
white beans, cherry tomatoes, and fresh basil, all mixed together with lime juice, olive oil, and cayenne pepper,
β
β
Lemony Snicket (A Series of Unfortunate Events Complete Collection: Books 1-13: With Bonus Material)
β
take either forty-eight or eighty-four pages to
β
β
Lemony Snicket (A Series of Unfortunate Events Complete Collection: Books 1-13: With Bonus Material)
Lemony Snicket (A Series of Unfortunate Events Complete Collection: Books 1-13: With Bonus Material)
β
IN THE UNFORTUNATE EVENT THAT YOU FIND YOURSELF CORNERED BY A MEMBER OF THE MIDNIGHT SUN, PICK YOUR NOSE.
β
β
Pseudonymous Bosch (This Isn't What It Looks Like (The Secret Series Book 3))
β
A rural life of moral simplicity, despite its monotony, is the preferable personal narrative to a daring life of impulsive passion, which only leads to tragedy.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Slippery Slope (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #10))
β
But I will take a page from the book of the Snow Scout leader, and skip ahead to the next interesting thing that happened, which was very, very late at night, when so many interesting parts of stories happen and so many people miss them because they are asleep in their beds, or hiding in the broom closet of a mustard factory, disguised as a dustpan to fool the night watchwoman. It
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Slippery Slope (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #10))
β
that a story in The Daily Punctilio was completely true, and to show this article to so many volunteers, including the Baudelaire parents, the Snicket siblings, and the woman I happened to love.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (A Series of Unfortunate Events Collection: Books 10-13 (A Series of Unfortunate Events Boxset Book 4))
β
The first sentence was "This tome will endeavor to scrutinize, in quasi-inclusive breadth, the epistemology of ophthalmologically contrived appraisals of ocular systems and the subsequent and requisite exertions imperative for expugnation of injurious states," and as Violet read it out loud to her sister, both children felt the dread that comes when you begin a very boring and difficult book.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Miserable Mill (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #4))
β
She turned her attention back to the book, and reread the sentence one more time, but this time she simply skipped the words she did not know. As often happens when one reads in this way, Violet's brain made a little humming noise as she encountered each word - or each part of a word - she did not know. So inside her head, the opening sentence of chapter twelve read as follows: "'Hypnosis is an hmmm yet hmmm method hmmm and should not be hmmmed by hmmms,'" and although she could not tell exactly what it meant, she could guess. "It could mean," she guessed to herself, "that hypnosis is a difficult method and should not be learned by amateurs," and the interesting thing is that she was not too far off.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Miserable Mill (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #4))
β
In this way, the story of the Baudelaire orphans is like an onion, and if you insist on reading each and every thin, papery layer in A Series of Unfortunate Events, your only reward will be 170 chapters of misery in your library and countless tears in your eyes.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (A Series of Unfortunate Events Collection: Books 10-13 (A Series of Unfortunate Events Boxset Book 4))
β
It may be difficult to believe, but, at any given moment, someone somewhere is in a dangerous situation and other people in some other place are dancing and having a good time. The world is often like this. A celebration here; terrible trouble just outside the door.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (A Series of Unfortunate Events (Books 1-10))
β
But the siblings could scarcely remember when they had been able to relax and do the things they liked to do best. It seemed ages since Violet had been able to sit around and think of inventions, instead of frantically building something to get them out of trouble. Klaus could barely remember the last book he had read for his own enjoyment, instead of as research to defeat one of Olaf's schemes. And Sunny had used her teeth many, many times to escape from difficult situations, but it had been quite a while since she had bitten something recreationally.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Carnivorous Carnival (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #9))
β
Drat!" Dr. Orwell said. "He's unhypnotized! How in the world would a child know a complicated word like 'inordinate'?"
"These brats know lots of words," Shirley said, in her ridiculously fake high voice. "They're book addicts. But we can still create an accident and win the fortune!
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Miserable Mill (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #4))
β
But finally, into the world came a baby girl, just as, Iβm very, very sorry to say, her mother, and my sister, slipped away from the world after a long night of sufferingβbut also a night of joy, as the birth of a baby is always good news, no matter how much bad news the baby will hear later.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (A Series of Unfortunate Events Collection: Books 10-13 (A Series of Unfortunate Events Boxset Book 4))
β
There are many, many types of books in the world, which makes good sense, because there are many, many types of people, and everybody wants to read something different. For instance, people who hate stories in which terrible things happen to small children should put this book down immediately.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #1))
β
The Baudelaires' journey up the Vertical Flame Diversion was so dark and treacherous that it is not enough to write βThe Baudelaires' journey up the Vertical Flame Diversion was so dark and treacherous that it is not enough to write 'The Baudelaires' journey up the Vertical Flame Diversion was so dark and treacherous that it is not enough to write βThe Baudelaires' journey up the Vertical Flame Diversion was so dark and treacherous that it is not enough to write 'The Baudelaires' journey up the Vertical Flame Diversion was so dark and treacherous that it is not enough to write βMy dear sister, I am taking a great risk in hiding a letter to you inside one of my books, but I am certain that even the most melancholy and well-read people in the world have found my account of the lives of the three Baudelaire children even more wretched than I had promised, and so this book will stay on the shelves of libraries, utterly ignored, waiting for you to open it and find this message.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Slippery Slope (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #10))
β
But unlike this book, the dictionary also discusses words that are far more pleasant to contemplate. The word βbubbleβ is in the dictionary, for instance, as is the word βpeacock,β the word βvacation,β and the words βtheβ βauthorβsβ βexecutionβ βhasβ βbeenβ βcanceled,β which make up a sentence that is always pleasant to hear. So
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Ersatz Elevator (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #6))
β
Whether is was Uncle Monty's library of reptile books, or Aunt Josephine's library of grammar books, or Justice Strauss's library of law books, or, best of all their parents' library of all kinds of books - all burn up now, alas - libraries always made them feel a little better. Just knowing that they could read made the Baudelaire orphans feel as if their wretched lives could be a little brighter.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Miserable Mill (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #4))
β
A taciturn writer, for instance, might produce only one short poem every ten years, which is unlikely to annoy anyone, whereas someone who writes twelve or thirteen books in a relatively short time is likely to find themselves hiding under the coffee table of a notorious villain, holding his breath, hoping nobody at the cocktail party will notice the trembling backgammon set, and wondering, as the inkstain spreads across the carpeting, if certain literary exercises have been entirely worthwhile.
β
β
Lemony Snicket (The Penultimate Peril (A Series of Unfortunate Events, #12))
β
Kathyβs teachers view her as a good student who always does her homework but rarely participates in class. Her close friends see her as a loyal and trustworthy person who is a lot of fun once you get to know her. The other students in school think she is shy and very quiet.
None of them realize how much Kathy struggles with everyday life. When teachers call on her in class, her heart races, her face gets red and hot, and she forgets what she wants to say.
Kathy believes that people think she is stupid and inadequate. She imagines that classmates and teachers talk behind her back about the silly things she says. She makes excuses not to go to social events because she is terrified she will do something awkward. Staying home while her friends are out having a good time also upsets her. βWhy canβt I just act like other people?β she often thinks.
Although Kathy feels isolated, she has a very common problem--social anxiety. Literally millions of people are so affected by self-consciousness that they have difficulties in social situations. For some, the anxiety occurs during very specific events, such as giving a speech or eating in public. For others, like Kathy, social anxiety is part of everyday life.
Unfortunately, social anxiety is not an easily diagnosed condition. Instead, it is often viewed as the far edge of a continuum of behaviors and feelings that occur during social situations. Although you may not have as much difficulty as Kathy, shyness may still be causing you distress, affecting your relationships, or making you act in ways with which you are not happy. If this is the case, you will benefit from the advice and techniques provided in this book.
The good news is that it is possible to change your thinking and behavior. However, there are no easy solutions. It takes strong motivation and time to overcome social anxiety. It might even be necessary to see a professional therapist or take medication. Eventually, becoming free of your anxiety will make the hard work well worth the effort.
This book will help you understand social anxiety and the impact it can have on your life, now and in the future. You will find out how the disorder is diagnosed, you will receive information on professional guidance, and you will learn ways to cope with and manage the symptoms. Becoming an extroverted person is probably unlikely, but you can become more confident in social situations and increase your self-esteem.
β
β
Heather Moehn (Social Anxiety (Coping With Series))