The Penultimate Peril (Lemony Snicket)

Denouement is not the end, but the untangling of the narrative's strands, which comes before the end. In this book, the kids become concierges and flaneurs (in the sense invented by Charles Baudelaire, of "a person who walks the city in order to experience it") in the Hotel Denouement, which was created by Dewey Denouement according to the categories of the Dewey Decimal System. Interestingly, the library aspect of the hotel is less important than it's extensive (and secret) catalogue of noble and vile actions. As the strands of narrative untangles, we get to know most of the answers to the questions we've had about VFD, and the kids learn some damning details of their parents lives. No matter how morally ambiguous their world has become, they still know that each person is responsible for the choices he or she makes. "What else could I do?" is never an adequate justification for not taking the noble path. We also learn for the first time, i think, that the Baudelaire's Dad was called Bertrand.

This is one of the best books in the series. My other favorites are The Hostile Hospital and The Grim Grotto.

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Quotes:

For Beatrice --
No one could extinguish my love,
or your house.

Deciding whether to trust a person is like deciding whether or not to climb a tree, because you might get a wonderful view from the highest branch, or you might simply get covered in sap, and for this reason many people choose to spend their time alone and indoors, where it is harder to get a splinter.

Wrong! -- sound made by the clock in the lobby of the Hotel Denouement.

Are you who I think you are?

I didn't realize this was a sad occasion.

I'm a ballplaying cowboy superhero soldier pirate! -- Carmelita Spats

"I'm not sure we are noble," Klaus said quietly, flipping the pages of his commonplace book. "We caused those accidents at the lumbermill. We're responsible for the destruction of the hospital. We helped start the fire that destroyed Madame Lulu's archival library We---"
"Enough," Dewey interrupted gently, putting a hand on Klaus' shouder. "You're noble enough, Baudelaires. That's all we can ask for in this world."

A small mercy is simply a thing that has gone right in a world cone wrong, like a sprig of delicious parsley next to a spoiled tuna sandwich, or a lovely dandelion in a garden that's being devoured by vicious goats. A small mercy, like a small flyswatter, is unlikely to be of any real help...

"Scalia," Sunny said. She meant something like, "It doesn't seem like the literal interpretation makes any sense."

"You can find any item in a library if you have one thing."
"Catalog?" Sunny asked.
"No," Count Olaf replied, and pointed the harpoon gun at the judge. "A hostage."

Justice isn't being served in the lobby, or anywhere else in the world!" (Count Olaf)

“Wow!” squealed another voice. “Wait until the readers of The Daily Punctilio read the headline: ‘VICIOUS MURDER AT HOTEL DENOUEMENT!’ That’s much more exciting than an accident!”