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A review by bhnmt61
The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow
3.0
It took me a week or so to get through the first half of this book, not because there’s anything wrong with it, but because i have a hard time with characters who continually do things that make no sense. I like competent characters, characters who figure out how to do things, or learn new skills, or fail the first time they try something but then the next time they are smarter and cagey-er.
For the first half of this book, January, the heroine, just keeps doing the same unsuccessful things over and over, and when something doesn’t work, never fear, it won’t keep her from doing it again a chapter or two later. How am I supposed to have any respect for a 17-year-old who can’t figure out how to leave her house without getting caught? Any teenager worth their proverbial salt can do this. It just makes her look stupid.
There are plenty of people who enjoy heroines who are charming and/or relatable in their lack of skill, who run up their credit cards or crumple the fender of their car or find themselves in the same sticky situation they were in a few months earlier and they’re not quite sure how they got there. Those characters can be likeable and appealing, and the way they are continually the victims of people or circumstances helps establish the challenges they face. Competence is irrelevant.
But competence is not irrelevant to me. I am a big fan of competence porn, as they call it. When one of your long-time loyal companions asks you to do something using your magical skills, you don’t say “I can’t.” You say, “I don’t know how to do that, but I will figure it out.” (To be fair, that is the response January makes 100-ish pages later, but the first time she just refuses.)
Two things kept me going with this book— one is that my first bookish love was Narnia, and I’m willing to forgive a lot for magical doors between worlds; and the other was the alternating story of Adelaide, which was far more interesting to me. And eventually my slogging through paid off, because the last bit was better. But mainly I just want to go back and re-read Voyage of the Dawn Treader now.
For the first half of this book, January, the heroine, just keeps doing the same unsuccessful things over and over, and when something doesn’t work, never fear, it won’t keep her from doing it again a chapter or two later. How am I supposed to have any respect for a 17-year-old who can’t figure out how to leave her house without getting caught? Any teenager worth their proverbial salt can do this. It just makes her look stupid.
There are plenty of people who enjoy heroines who are charming and/or relatable in their lack of skill, who run up their credit cards or crumple the fender of their car or find themselves in the same sticky situation they were in a few months earlier and they’re not quite sure how they got there. Those characters can be likeable and appealing, and the way they are continually the victims of people or circumstances helps establish the challenges they face. Competence is irrelevant.
But competence is not irrelevant to me. I am a big fan of competence porn, as they call it. When one of your long-time loyal companions asks you to do something using your magical skills, you don’t say “I can’t.” You say, “I don’t know how to do that, but I will figure it out.” (To be fair, that is the response January makes 100-ish pages later, but the first time she just refuses.)
Two things kept me going with this book— one is that my first bookish love was Narnia, and I’m willing to forgive a lot for magical doors between worlds; and the other was the alternating story of Adelaide, which was far more interesting to me. And eventually my slogging through paid off, because the last bit was better. But mainly I just want to go back and re-read Voyage of the Dawn Treader now.