Chapter 1 Summary

"My Parents are Lost at Sea": As she introduces herself, eleven-year-old narrator Primrose Squarp describes herself as having "hair the color of carrots in an apricot glaze", and comments that the recipe is to follow. She then describes how her parents separately disappeared during a storm at sea, leaving her with the mothball-infested, disapproving Miss Perfidy. Primrose also comments that while everyone around her in her home town of Coal Harbor, British Columbia, seems convinced that her parents are dead, she remains sure that they are simply lost on an island somewhere. She adds that every time she mentions this, Miss Perfidy simply walks away. Miss Perfidy, it turns out, is being paid three dollars an hour out of the estate of Primrose's parents to look after her, money that is quickly running out. At a special meeting of the town council, called...