Review by New York Times Review
YOU can't blame a mystery lover for approaching "'Who Could That Be at This Hour?'" with trepidation. Lemony Snicket has burned us before. Like "The X-Files," "Lost" and countless other conspiracy-driven sagas, Snicket's 13 volumes of "A Series of Unfortunate Events" left fans with far more questions than answers. What was the true purpose of the clandestine organization known as V.F.D.? Why was everyone terrified of that question-mark-shaped shadow in the ocean? What was hidden in that MacGuffin of a sugar bowl everybody wanted? But in contrast to the frustratingly finite television series mentioned above, "Unfortunate Events" gave readers a glimmer of hope. Because the series's pseudonymous author was also one of its characters - and he never went away. In the six years since "The End," Lemony Snicket has been out there, a living spinoff, whose mere existence has held the lingering promise of "More to come. . . ." "'Who Could That Be af This Hour?'" is the first chapter of "All the Wrong Questions," a new mock-autobiographical series that recounts the almost 13-year-old Lemony's apprenticeship with an enigmatic secret society - a prequel to "Unfortunate Events." And while that first series worked as both a tribute to and parody of Gothic literature, this new one does the same for noir detective fiction. The book opens with the pulpy, "There was a town, and there was a girl and there was a theft." Its "Maltese Falcon"-esque plot, which pivots around a missing statue, has more twists than a soft-serve ice cream cone. And young Lemony's descriptions of the people he meets are hard-boiled enough to make Philip Marlowe proud ("Green eyes she had, and hair so black it made the night look pale"). There's even a character named Dashiell. However, this book is no mere exercise in genre spoofing; this is, after all, a Lemony Snicket novel. That means you get a delightfully eccentric supporting cast, which here includes a tween reporter named Moxie who dresses like Annie Hall and uses words like "gimcrack." It also means you get snarkily dry humor - the lobby of a lackluster hotel, for instance, displays a bowl of peanuts "that were either salted or dusty" - and unapologetic blasts of absurdity, like a pair of prepubescent taxi drivers (Pip steers, while Squeak works the pedals). And, as with all Snicket novels, you get a narrator with a penchant for defining every 10-cent word he uses. Over the course of 13 "Unfortunate Events" books, this practice grew tiresome - a word that here means I wish he hadn't done it so much. However, in "'Who Could That Be at This Hour?'" we are made privy to the genesis of Lemony's defining habit: He himself is subjected to it by an adult spy tutor who sorely underestimates his abilities. In a pleasing meta twist, young Lemony echoes the kind of gimme-some-credit grumbles that may have been voiced by real-life Snicket readers (as when our hero gripes, "I know what penchant means"). All of it serves to make the tween Lemony a lively and endearingly peculiar protagonist, the kind of figure who would be at home in a Wes Anderson film. At one point Lemony reveals that anyone who wanted to torture him for information would simply need to get his socks wet. But what about all those unsolved mysteries from "Unfortunate Events"? The book's pages are peppered with tempting maybe-clues - a reference to a well-known character, the mention of a mythical sea beast whose body curls up like a question mark. Are these allusions or illusions? It's all part of the game that Snicket plays with his readers. The puzzle, he seems to tell us, is more important than its solution. However, there is a complete, self-contained mystery within "'Who Could That Be at This Hour?'" By the end, you will know the identity of the statue thief. And you will have had a great time getting there. But don't dream for a second that you'll finish the book without at least a dozen new unanswered riddles. And will those conundrums be resolved in this series? Will any of them truly tie in to the previous books? Will the success of this series really depend on providing some sort of closure? Or am I asking all the wrong questions? Christopher Healy is the author of "The Hero's Guide to Saving Your Kingdom." its sequel will be published in April.
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [October 14, 2012]
Review by Booklist Review
Oh, Lemony Snicket. How you confound us. For instance, in this book, the first of the All the Wrong Questions series, you give us so many unmoored happenings that readers may be inclined to believe they've landed in the middle of the second book. True, we will learn you're an almost-13-year-old boy and that you escape your parents (or are they your parents?!) in a tea room to meet the woman with whom you'll apprentice. And then you and S. Theodora Markson (what does the S stand for?) make your way to a sea town, now devoid of the ink for which it's famous, and deserted by its residents, to find a statue rather like the Maltese Falcon, only it's the Bombinating Beast. Someone is waiting for you back home, but who? What's this secret program you seem to be a part of? Who cares about the Bombinating Beast? (You may take that comment any way you wish.) But just as when you were with those charming Baudelaire children, the adventures roll and one can only speculate what's around the corner. Not that it will do any good. Kudos to Seth for the marvelous woodcut art. The pictures seem to hold clues. Or do they? HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Please, it's Lemony Snicket. Enough said.--Cooper, Ilene Copyright 2010 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Snicket, author of the wildly successful Series of Unfortunate Events stories, returns with the first in the projected four-volume All the Wrong Questions series, supplying "autobiographical" accounts of his unusual childhood. Nearly 13 when the book opens, Snicket is beginning his apprenticeship for a mysterious organization under the tutelage of dimwitted S. Theodora Markson, who is ranked dead last in effectiveness by the agency but who may be the source of Snicket's tic of defining vocabulary pedantically, a word which here means, oh, never mind. Unlike Snicket's Unauthorized Biography (HarperCollins, 2002), which left readers as uninformed about him as they were before they read it, this account reveals that Lemony is "an excellent reader, a good cook, a mediocre musician, and an awful quarreler." Not mind-blowing, but it's a start. And perhaps not true. Straight answers are hard to find as Snicket and Markson investigate a theft in a seaside town that's been drained of its sea, encountering deception and double crosses at every turn. Full of Snicket's trademark droll humor and maddeningly open-ended, this will have readers clamoring for volume two. Ages 9-up. Agent: Charlotte Sheedy Literary Agency. (Oct.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by School Library Journal Review
Gr 4-7-In this "autobiographical" mystery, a teenaged Lemony Snicket recounts his early experiences as an apprentice to S. Theodora Markson, a pretentious woman who is not remotely as intelligent as she pretends. The two travel to the formerly seaside (but now not) town of Stain'd-by-the-Sea to investigate the theft of, what they are told, is a priceless heirloom. The identity of the culprit is obvious. Or is it? There's much more to this case than meets the eye. To uncover what's really going on, the inquisitive Snicket must figure out who he can trust and which questions to ask before it's too late. This fast-paced whodunit is likely to leave readers with questions of their own. Hopefully, they're the right questions-which, hopefully, will be answered in upcoming sequels. Written in Snicket's gloomy, yet undeniably charming, signature style and populated with wonderfully quirky characters, this enjoyable start of a new series will thrill fans of the author's earlier works and have even reluctant readers turning pages with the fervor of seasoned bookworms. A must-have.-Alissa J. Bach, Oxford Public Library, MI (c) Copyright 2012. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Horn Book Review
Where did Lemony Snicket spring from? This detective novel/faux memoir provides a partial, gnomic, and Snickety answer. Young Lemony is a detective apprentice, in the Sam Spade mode. "I used to be that young man, almost thirteen, walking alone down an empty street in a half-faded town." Under the aegis of his hapless "chaperone," S. Theodora Markson, Lemony successfully investigates the theft of a black wooden statue. In a style equal parts deadpan and just plain nutty, Snicket demonstrates his gift for metaphor -- "he looked like the child of a man and a log"; "he had the hairstyle one gets if one is attacked by a scissors-carrying maniac" -- and includes a game of referencing classic children's books in noirish terms: "I sat in my usual spot and read about someone who was a true friend and a good writer who lived on a bloodthirsty farm where nearly everyone was in danger of some sort." In terms of actual story, "loose ends" doesn't really begin to cover it, as per the Series of Unfortunate Events. Illustrations by cartoonist Seth are a perfect tonal match. Seth and Snicket, separated at birth? Take a deep breath, fans: this is the first of a new series. sarah ellis (c) Copyright 2013. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Young Mr. Snicket seems to always ask the wrong questions. In the basin of a bay drained of seawater, where giant needles extract ink from octopi underground, sits Stain'd-by-the-Sea, the mostly deserted town where 12-year-old Lemony Snicket takes his first case as apprentice to chaperone S. Theodora Markson. They have been hired by Mrs. Murphy Sallis to retrieve a vastly valuable statue of the local legend, the Bombinating Beast, from her neighbors and frenemies the Mallahans. Nothing's what it seemswell, the adults are mostly nitwitsand Snicket is usually preoccupied with someone he left in the city doing something he should be helping her do. With the help and/or hindrance of girls Moxie and Ellington, can Snicket keep his promises and come close to solving a mystery? Author Snicket (aka Daniel Handler) returns with a tale of fictional-character Snicket's early years, between his unconventional education and his chronicling of the woes of the Baudelaires. Intact from his earlier series are the gothic wackiness, linguistic play and literary allusions. This first in a series of four is less grim and cynical and more noir and pragmatic than Snicket's earlier works, but just as much fun. Fans of the Series of Unfortunate Events will be in heaven picking out tidbit references to the tridecalogy, but readers who've yet to delve into that well of sadness will have no problem enjoying this weird and witty yarn. (Mystery. 8-12)]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
