One for the Clause

"Tears are curious things, for like earthquakes and puppet shows they can occur at any time, without any warning and without any good reason." - Lemony Snicket, A Series of Unfortunate Events

Lemony Snicket is one for dependent clauses, repetition and nonsensical connections. I like this sentence because it's representative of his style - a term which here means the way he expresses himself through writing. He often repeats the same sentence structures, dependent clauses and even entire sentences verbatim. Sometimes writers use this technique and try to hide it because it's bad to be repetitive, but they want to give you some hint of connection. Snicket makes his repetition - a term which here means to say something over and over again - completely obvious by overdoing it. The effect is different because the technique does not assume the reader's inability to make the connection on his/her own. He does it almost as an aside to let us know that he knows that we know while making fun of the characters that don't know. His writing carries the same wink-wink nudge-nudge exclusivity as Truss's. He wants us to be a part of his club, and he accomplishes that by stylistically assuming we already are.