Hal is on his way." The nurse announced reentering the room.

I love meeting people who have absolutely no sense of irony. It's really fascinating to imagine what it would be like to go through life without understanding even the most basic of ironies.

I think pirates, like astronauts, particularly for a boy, are always kind of worth thinking about.

Are you who I think you are?

With a library it is easier to hope for serendipity than to look for a precise answer.

In America now there is this phenomenon called helicopter parenting, where you're hovering over your child for the whole time. Parents there view their job as being to make sure their kid never has a moment of unhappiness. Of course, as a parent myself, I can understand the urge, but I don't know whether it would be healthy or possible.

The story of the Baudelaires takes place in a very real world, where some people are laughed at just because they have something wrong with them, and where children can find themselves all alone in the world, struggling to understand the mystery that surrounds them.