The siblings still have nightmares about Count Olaf. The book opens with the orphans travelling through the grim landscape to Tedia as Poe has decided they should stay with a distant relative in the country.
Uncle Monty is very friendly, feeding them coconut cake and showing them his Reptile Room, complete with a library and a new breed of snake (the Incredibly Deadly Viper - he named it himself) he plans to show to the Herpetological Society the next month.
Narrator interjects with details about his life (Madame diLustro, a detective friend of his) and that he is on the deck of a yacht, belonging to Bela, a friend of his.
The Incredibly Deadly Viper was discovered in the southwest forest of an unnamed country or region.
Mention made of common feelings which don't normally get mentioned (sinking when a lift / elevator suddenly goes down, when you bring your foot down on a step you don't expect to be there).
Giddy uncle a reference to the phrase my giddy aunt
.
Olaf threatens to cut off one of Sunny's toes.
Monty wanted to see a film called Zombies in the Snow
The Prospero, the ship that will take them all to South America and Peru. Prospero was a character from Shakespeare's The Tempest, about a shipwreck on a stormy island.
Monty reveals that he is suspicious of Stephano, but as a herpetological spy, not as Count Olaf, and reveals that he has torn up Stephano's ticket so he won't be travelling. Shortly after this Olaf makes an unsuccessful attempt on Monty's life (but before he finds out his ticket has been ripped up).
The following morning Monty is found by the orphans, dead, apparently from a snakebite. Olaf forces the siblings into the jeep, brandishing his knife. On the way to Hazy Harbor Olaf crashes into Mr. Poe.
City laws, alledgedly won't allow another to drive Dr. Lucafont's car.
