The reason this is three stars instead of four is that I listened to the audiobook instead of reading the hard copy. There's nothing wrong with the audiobook--it's read by a cast of narrators that would top the all star list of any hipster parent (I'm identifying you as a hipster parent if you can immediately recognize the voices of Ira Glass, Sarah Vowell, Rachel Maddow, and Terry Gross). And it's really fun to listen to Vowell, Gross, and the rest, but it would have been nicer to also see the adorable drawings by Seth (just Seth) interspersed throughout the stories. 
 Another drawback to having only the audiobook is that the conclusion to each of the mysterious incidents are separated from the ends of each story ("for security reasons"), and I would have loved to immediately flip to the end of the book after each story; but I had to wait. And by the time I got to the conclusions, I didn't have each story fresh in my mind. 
 Now, the terrific word play, Snicket snarkiness, and modern day boy detective genre are a joy to read. But I would recommend that you get the audiobook and the hard copy so that if you're reading it with a child, you and your little one can read along and look at the pictures as the terrific cast of narrators reads the stories. This would be especially beneficial since there are so many vocabulary nuggets that are explained in contextual asides--for young readers it would be great to see the words typed out and hear them out loud. And if you're reading it alone, just as an adult who loves Snicket stories, then you would have the fun of the illustrations and listening to Terry Gross read a story about a kidnapped newt. It's even better than you can imagine.