Who Could That Be at This Hour?

Lemony Snicket writes about himself at nearly thirteen, in a mystery for 9 year olds set in a town where somebody has drained the sea away, called Who Could That Be at This Hour?

What happens

It starts with the worst eggs in the city. Snicket is in a tearoom with his parents, saying goodbye, wearing a graduation suit that has hung in his wardrobe for weeks looking like an empty person.

A woman sweeps in, buys an envelope, drops a note in his lap and walks out. Climb out of the bathroom window. Green roadster. Five minutes.

He goes. And here is the detail that tells you what kind of book this is. There is already a folding ladder hidden behind the toilet, because he put it there himself.

His new chaperone is S. Theodora Markson, who will not say what the S stands for. She tells him at once that she is not his friend, not his teacher, and not anyone who is going to take care of him. Then she drives him to Stain'd-by-the-Sea, where enormous needles pump ink out of frightened octopuses living in deep wells, and you have to put a mask on to get in.

There is a statue missing. An old woman says it is hers and that the family at the lighthouse have stolen it. She also says she wants nothing done to them, because they are nice people. Snicket notices that this does not add up. He asks the wrong question anyway, and he warns you on the first page that he is going to.

Reading it is like being let in on a joke. The narrator already knows how badly all this ends and keeps saying so. He defines words for you mid-sentence, which sounds irritating and is in fact the best running gag in the book. He is polite, stubborn and thirteen, and not one adult is any use to him.

A note on the tone. It is dry rather than warm. Nobody gets comforted. Snicket says goodbye to his parents in the first few pages and that is more or less the last of them, with no explanation offered. A child who wants somebody sensible to be in charge may find this bleak. A child who thinks useless grown-ups are hilarious will be very happy indeed.

It is also the first of four and says so, so expect to finish holding several loose ends.

What to read next

When Did You See Her Last picks up immediately after, with a missing girl, the same hopeless chaperone, and a statue Snicket has not stopped thinking about.