"Because for the first time in forever, she'd felt like she was going home, and that feeling had been enough to move her feet, slowly at first, and then faster, and faster, until she had been running through the clean night air, and nothing else had mattered, or would ever matter again--"
THIS REVIEW IS SPOILER FREE
I started reading Every Heart a Doorway on Christmas morning. I finished it two days later. Not to be dramatic, but I literally have not stopped thinking about it since. I am what the kids call ‘whipped’. When I first heard about this book a few weeks ago, I didn’t pay it any significant attention; right off the bat, I knew it was a fantasy, and I notoriously don’t love the fantasy genre, so I safely assumed it wouldn’t be for me. Yet something drew me to this book; something told me that I wouldn’t regret giving it a chance. So I gave it a chance. Lo and behold, I definitely do not regret it. With four days to go until my Favourite Books of 2017 post went live, Every Heart a Doorway shot straight to #1. I have so much to say about this book. I’m going to jump right into it.
I had never heard of Seanan McGuire, the author of Every Heart a Doorway, before I picked up her book, but it turns out that the woman is insanely prolific, having written 30+ books in the last eight years. Christ Almighty, I’d love to be that productive. Her talent was evident from the first line. The prose in this novella… I hope McGuire quit her day job when she started writing, because her capability to wield and weave words is unprecedented, and she should not waste her time doing anything else. As a writer myself, I found McGuire’s eloquence nothing short of awe-inspiring. There was something almost magical about it, and the feeling that magic was glittering between each word lent itself perfectly to the atmosphere of the story. The mood of this book is quiet, mystical. Maybe it’s because of the cover, but reading Every Heart a Doorway reminded me of standing alone in a still, silent forest clearing, sunlight filtering gently through the canopy of trees, whispering wind and the faint flutes of birds the only sounds to be heard. (I clearly had a very synesthetic reaction to this book.) McGuire’s style of writing suited this tone so well. Her words are so precisely chosen and arranged, yet they don’t feel stiff or unyielding; they feel special, and careful, and lovely. They sing in harmony with the atmosphere of the story. There’s being a talented writer, and then there’s being so talented that your writing becomes not simply the mode of storytelling, but a part of the ambience, and I’ve never read a book where the genre and the writing style are such a match made in heaven.
Every Heart a Doorway is a story about belonging, and I think the title of the book captures this idea perfectly. Reminiscent of The Chronicles of Narnia and the wardrobe to another world, the characters in Every Heart a Doorway have walked through magical portals called ‘doors’ and discovered marvellous worlds beyond them. Similar to Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children, however, McGuire’s novella doesn’t take place in a fantasy land; it takes place in a real world, and follows characters who have been forced back through their doors, turfed out of their new homes, and who now need to readjust to their old, unfulfilling lives. I found the lore surrounding the doors especially intriguing. A door would not open for just anyone. One could not share their door with another person, could not invite their friends to visit their world or, indeed, visit anyone else’s; your door belonged to you and you alone, because your door understood you. Your door was tailored to you, knew you better than anyone else; the ‘real world’ was your de facto home, but your door led you to the world where you could finally discover and become the truest version of yourself. Every heart was a doorway, and every doorway was for only one heart. It sounds so isolating and lonely, yet also so uplifting and wistful. To belong so innately, so irrevocably… it only makes sense that the children in the story wanted more than anything else to find their doors again.
And, of course, the thing that made me gasp out loud and almost drop the book: the main character of Every Heart a Doorway is asexual. I don’t know how this detail escaped me when I was first sniffing out this book. I have no idea why nobody is talking about this, because they really should be. On the forty-second page of the novel, Nancy, our protagonist, comes out both to her roommate and to the reader as asexual. First of all, I have a natural bias towards any media that includes asexual representation, given my personal affinity with the subject matter. Obviously, my love for this book has been in-part inspired by its diversity (there is also a transgender side character, and an androgynous side character who takes on the leading role in the companion novel, Down Among the Sticks and Bones, which I cannot wait to read). Aside from my (perfectly reasonable) bias, what I really loved about McGuire’s depiction of asexuality was the fact that Nancy doesn’t spend the entire book wondering whether or not she might be asexual. From page 42, she just knows -- has known, in fact, for quite a while. She’s pretty used to explaining the whole thing by now, and on a personal level, I found that so relatable -- shows like BoJack Horseman make me happy because they represent who I used to be and how I used to feel about my sexuality, but books like Every Heart a Doorway make me happier because they represent who I am and what I feel now. Fiction that relates the journey of self-discovery is invaluable. It creates a safe space for readers to explore themselves and to find comfort in the shared experiences of people who understand what they are going through on a personal level -- but I think it’s also really important to have representative fiction where the characters aren’t still finding themselves. They’ve found themselves, and they are at peace with who they are. This kind of representation helps normalise minority sexualities, and it also inspires self-confidence and validation. It’s nice, for once, to have skipped the journey and to just start reading from the destination. It’s nice to read asexuality as something established and set in stone.
Every Heart a Doorway is about the closest thing I’ve ever found to a book version of Gravity Falls. I love Gravity Falls because of its blending of target audiences. The show is pitched at children and pre-teens and ran its two seasons on the Disney Channel, but it also appeals to older viewers because of its dry sense of humour, its complex world-building, and its (sometimes) mature tone. Every Heart a Doorway is just the same: it’s whimsical and magical, breathtakingly atmospheric, but it is definitely not a book for children. It has the big heart of a children’s story, but its complexity and maturity age it like a fine wine; one might even say that this book has an old soul. If not for its occasional references to the 21st century, this book would be timeless. It breathes; it has a heart that beats. It lives in you and with you long after you finish reading. Goodness, am I glad that this marvellous book is not a standalone.
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