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A review by mindsplinters
The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow
adventurous
challenging
emotional
inspiring
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Glorious language in a world inspired by all of those portal fantasies that served as a staple to so many of our childhoods. When we are little, we know that words have power. When we get older... we forget. This book makes you remember in the most visceral way as you follow the inner and outer and round-about journey of January Scaller and her mother and her father and her associates. The entire thing is caught midway between a fairy tale and a very real world story of wealth and haves and have-nots. While there is a lot of magic here, not just in the words used by the author or the stuff drawn from the characters' will, there is also a lot of brutal honesty. Even in the other worlds mentioned, there is no shying away from the harsh brutality that might be there. Doubly so with what we readers might reasonably call our own. At the turn of the century (1900, that is), there was a lot going on in the world and not all of it was good. Progress came in two flavors, good and bad, but not everyone can tell them apart. Racism, stratification of society, people actively fighting to stay on top of the heap.
January is witness to it all but only slowly starts to actually understand and realize what it all means. As a character, she has a very long way to grow and go and it is both pleasure and pain to be her companion. Without quite coming out and saying it, the author holds us witness to the emotional abuse and neglect, the masked concern, and care with strings that January endures. We see the flaws; January has to learn to see the poison behind and beneath it all. Understandably, as a complex and very human character, she fights the knowledge at times or backslides. After all, it is sometimes much easier to ignore a door or close it than to deal with what might come through it.
In the end, though, this book is so full of hope and strength and you leave it battered and scarred but with a new determination. As January says (via Alix E Harrow) "I hope to every god you have the guts to do what needs doing. I hope you will find the cracks in the world and wedge them wider, so the light of other suns shines through; I hope you will keep the world unruly, messy, full of strange magics; I hope you will run through every open Door and tell stories when you return."
May we all have the bravery and conviction to STOP being polite when confronted with Wrongness and Evil.
January is witness to it all but only slowly starts to actually understand and realize what it all means. As a character, she has a very long way to grow and go and it is both pleasure and pain to be her companion. Without quite coming out and saying it, the author holds us witness to the emotional abuse and neglect, the masked concern, and care with strings that January endures. We see the flaws; January has to learn to see the poison behind and beneath it all. Understandably, as a complex and very human character, she fights the knowledge at times or backslides. After all, it is sometimes much easier to ignore a door or close it than to deal with what might come through it.
In the end, though, this book is so full of hope and strength and you leave it battered and scarred but with a new determination. As January says (via Alix E Harrow) "I hope to every god you have the guts to do what needs doing. I hope you will find the cracks in the world and wedge them wider, so the light of other suns shines through; I hope you will keep the world unruly, messy, full of strange magics; I hope you will run through every open Door and tell stories when you return."
May we all have the bravery and conviction to STOP being polite when confronted with Wrongness and Evil.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Emotional abuse, Self harm, Violence, and Animal cruelty
Moderate: Xenophobia and Racism