A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Austere Academy

The fifth book in Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events, which chronicles the miserable life of the Baudelaire orphans, The Austere Academy is the book where the series really starts to take shape and all future events that take place in the coming instalments can be linked back to this one. 

After escaping the clutches of the evil Count Olaf a fourth time, the Baudelaire orphans find themselves living in a boarding school, attending dreadfully dull classes and surrounded by not-very-nice classmates. The one upshot of their new home comes in the form of Duncan and Isadora Quagmire, two triplets who, like the Baudelaires, lost their parents and home in a terrible fire. The Baudelaire’s silver lining is cut short when Count Olaf, yet again, manages to track them down, but this time their new friends Isadora and Duncan are in just as much trouble as they are. 

It’s apparent to me now that most of the reviews for the Series of Unfortunate Events are going to be rather repetitive with little or no change as to what make each one so easy to read and enjoy. But I can safely say that The Austere Academy stands out a little further because, like Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, this is the book where the series begins to take shape and a new story begins to unfold, a mystery that the Baudelaire children must unravel in order to rid their lives of Count Olaf and his treachery and have their questions answered once and for all. 

What’s nicer about this book is the fact that, for the first time, the Baudelaire children are surrounded and working with characters closer to their own age, rather than adults. This gives the book and the mystery that comes to light in it, a much more exciting edge as the story seems to actually progress and move forward rather than go in a circle as the first four books did. 

Filled with nasty characters, new friends, terrible living quarters, horrible violin playing, and scrambled eggs, The Austere Academy is the fifth easy and enjoyable read in Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events.