Her parents think she was kidnapped (and in a way, she might have been) and just want her to fit it in this world, the world they say she belongs to, with its bright colours and cheerfulness and chaos. She learns that there are High Logic or High Nonsense, Wicked or Virtuous worlds with flexible alignments and interchanges. That’s where Nancy’s parents leave her one day (not knowing what the boarding school really is).Īt the Home, Nancy meets other Wayward Children. They go to Eleanor West’s Home for Wayward Children. But what happens to those who have been inexorably changed and want to go back? Who are just bidding their time hoping that their door will reopen one day?

There are those who never want to go back, who just want to move on and forget. To every kid who crossed a portal and is kicked back there is that moment of what-happens-next and what-do-I-do-now. This is the premise of Seanan McGuire’s marvellous novella Every Heart a Doorway. Or because you are no longer what they think you are. Fairyland or Underworld, it doesn’t matter, every heart a doorway and all that – you go where you are wanted and needed.

To fall in love or be needed and to be accepted and to truly fit in for the first time in one’s life. To travel into fantasy lands and get lost into worlds that are magical, or twisted, or nonsensical, or logical, or wicked, virtuous, dark or light. To find a door – a portal – and to cross it, as a child or young teenager: slipping through the shadows, through a wardrobe or a rabbit hole. How did I get this book: Review Copy from the Publisher Stand alone or series: Book 1 in a new series

There’s a darkness just around each corner, and when tragedy strikes, it’s up to Nancy and her new-found schoolmates to get to the heart of the matter. And each of them is seeking a way back to their own fantasy world.īut Nancy’s arrival marks a change at the Home. The children under Miss West’s care understand all too well. The things she’s experienced… they change a person. Every Heart a Doorway is the story about portal fantasies I never knew I needed.Ĭhildren have always disappeared under the right conditions slipping through the shadows under a bed or at the back of a wardrobe, tumbling down rabbit holes and into old wells, and emerging somewhere… else.īut magical lands have little need for used-up miracle children.

Every heart a doorway by seanan mcguire