Thirteen-year-old Lemony Snicket begins his apprenticeship with S. Theodora Markson of the secretive V.F.D. in the tiny dot of a town called Stain'd By The Sea, where he helps investigate the theft of a statue.

Even more terrible happenings concerning the Baudelaire orphans. Dear Customer, If you have not heard anything about the Baudelaire orphans, then before you listen to even one sentence you should know this: Violet, Klaus and Sunny are kindhearted and quick-witted, but their lives, I'm sorry to say, are filled with bad luck and misery. All of the stories about these three children are unhappy and wretched, and this one may be the worst of them all....

Violet, Klaus, and Sunny Baudelaire are taken in by a series of oddball relatives and others after their wealthy parents are killed in a fire. The first to take them in is the dastardly and cunning Count Olaf, who is only interested in their inheritance.

Three orphaned children uncover a relative's sinister plot to kill them and take the fortune their deceased parents have left for them.