Who Could It Be at This Hour - Lemony Snicket

All the Wrong Questions: Who Could It Be At This Hour by Lemony Snicket

 Lemony is back and is as weird as ever. I got this book as one of my ‘Free of the Week’ for purely selfish reasons: it’s a really good looking book. It's a hardcover and the front is engaging and it has a really interesting texture. I know, it's vain, but you have definitely touched a book and read it because you liked the weight and feel of it. Judging a book by its cover in it's purest form. 

Lemony Snicket writes about his younger days as an apprentice for an organization nobody knows anything about. He travels to Stain’d-By-the-Sea, which is no longer by the sea, to investigate the supposed theft of a precious and priceless heirloom. He runs into twins who drive a cab, a Moxie who definitely has moxie, and a killer (maybe?!) Bombinating Beast. He asks, as the series indicates, all the wrong questions and has now written about these questions in yet another series that you “shouldn’t be reading”.

Snicket is well known for his Series of Unfortunate Events which are written in the same style as this novel. I enjoyed Series of Unfortunate Events to a point. It got to be book ten and you really start getting concerned about these kids. It’s pretty messed up and I know it’s his shtick but seriously, can’t those kids have one happy day?

Never caught a break.

Who Could It Be at This Hour is written true to Snicket fashion: pessimistically, humorously, and intelligently.  Fans of Series of Unfortunate Events will enjoy this but frankly, I don’t think WCIBATH lives up to its predecessor series.  I've read other reviews of this book and they, mostly, say the same thing: this book feels like a second book. You are thrown into a plot that’s really interesting but doesn't seem complete. Maybe because it is a first book that has to live up to it’s big brother series but it feels like you are smack-dab in the middle of an open ended story. I did enjoy the story, don’t get me wrong, but I guess I had high expectations coming from such an innovative author like Lemony Snicket.

So mysterious.

This book definitely gives off a film noir feeling; if not an immature film noir. If you are a fan of Snicket’s linguistic play and wit, get this book. If you are a Lemony Snicket virgin, better to start with Series of Unfortunate Events to see what the hype is about.