Many people know Edward Gorey as “the fellow who wrote that alphabet book where the children die.” The true aficionados know that Gorey wrote multiple books where children die. The Hapless Child is one of the finest examples of horrible things happening to the young and helpless in the written language. Whether or not it is a wry parody of Dickensian tragedy or simply a heartlessly rendered misery, who can say? It does, however, contain some of Gorey’s most lavishly and beautifully detailed illustrations. How appalling.

Pomegranate, 2008. Hardcover.