The Hapless Child is widely regarded as one of Edward Gorey’s best books; happily it is now back in print.
 
The sorry tale of petite Charlotte Sophia’s catastrophic life is classic Gorey stuff—orphaned, mercilessly hazed by schoolmates, enslaved by a brute.
 
After an absence of many years we can all enjoy weeping for Charlotte Sophia again . . . and again, and again.

About the ARTIST
Edward St. John Gorey was a Harvard grad, a brilliant artist, a celebrated set and costume designer (his costumes for a Broadway production of Dracula earned him a Tony Award), a lover of animals (particularly cats) and the arts (he seldom missed a performance of the New York City Ballet), and an avid deltiologist—an obscure word so Gorey—like you might think he invented it himself (it means “a collector of postcards”).
 
His humorously unsettling drawings of vaguely Victorian innocents often facing unfortunate ends became familiar to a wide audience after appearing in the opening credits of the PBS television series Mystery!