Published: 5 April 2016 (print)/5 April 2016 (audio) 
Publisher: Tor.com/Macmillan Audio
Pages: 169/4 hrs and 45 mins
Narrator: Cynthia Hopkins
Format: Audiobook
Genre: Fantasy Fiction
★ ★ ★ ★ – 4 Stars
Eleanor West’s Home for Wayward Children
No Solicitations
No Visitors
No Quests
Children 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.
But magical lands have little need for used-up miracle children.
Nancy tumbled once, but now she’s back. The things she’s experienced… they change a person. The children under Miss West’s care understand all too well. And each of them is seeking a way back to their own fantasy world.
But Nancy’s arrival marks a change at the Home. 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.
No matter the cost.
In a premise that reminded me of Miss Peregrine initially, the story is about a girl who arrives at a boarding school for people who have travelled through portals into different worlds – lands of Nonsense, Logic, Fairy – and returned home changed and unsatisfied. Not that that’s what their families are being told.
The story captivates you from the beginning and I was drawn into this world of pretences and misleadings about Eleanor and this boarding school and what it actually did. As the story goes on you learn more about the worlds and the school, about children who have returned from their travels through doorways and how they are coping with being thrust back into their old lives whether by accident or through no choice of their own.
I thoroughly enjoyed the writing style and the tone McGuire has used – it’s fun and talks to the reader in conversational tones, not nonsensical or anything but matter of fact and with a mix of logic and nonsense while maintaining the seriousness. It’s hard to describe exactly but I loved it immensely.
The mystery was clever and I loved how there was surprises and shocks that come almost immediately changing any theory you may have even started to develop. Each character’s personality brings something to the story and it was hard not to marvel at McGuire’s imagination at these unique characters and their own histories and experiences.
I loved each of the characters we’re introduced to. I don’t want to spoil each of their journeys because I think discovering them is half the fun but I will say there is great representation, there is celebration of the quirky, the unusual, and while kids will always be kids, seeing a place that tries to promote and encourage unusual hobbies, to keep safe those who were cast out, and to embrace the different, was delightful.
I listened to the audiobook which was an excellent decision because it really heightened that unique writing style, and by the end of the book I was enraptured and was surprised how despite being only a short novella it was the perfect length. McGuire told a wonderfully interesting story and gave us detailed and fleshed out characters, a complicated mystery as well as introducing us to this entire new fantasy reality all while keeping it at 175 pages. It’s hard not to marvel at such a feat and I am definitely excited to explore this series and see what else McGuire has in store.
You can purchase Every Heart A Doorway via the following
Fishpond | Amazon | Amazon Aust | Audible
Stories have power.
Xar and Wish are on the final leg of their journey. First stop: The Mines of Unhappiness. Here, starvation is never far away for the Magical creatures who toil in its horrible depths. Xar and Wish must escape and fast; Xar needs to take control of his ever-growing Witchstain, and Wish must achieve her Destiny. But the Tazzelwurm is in their way, a grotesque monster who threatens to block every entrance.
Far to the north of the magical Old Kingdom, the Greenwash Bridge Company has been building a bridge for almost a hundred years. It is not an easy task, for many dangers threaten the bridge builders, from nomad raiders to Free Magic sorcerers. Despite the danger, Morghan wants nothing more than to join the Bridge Company as a cadet. But the company takes only the best, the most skillful Charter mages, and trains them hard, for the night might come when only a single young cadet must hold the bridge against many foes. Will Morghan be that cadet?
Xar and Wish are heroes with a huge task ahead–confronting the Nuckalavee is not for the faint hearted. But with Magic and Iron together, they might just have a chance of saving their beloved homes from those who seek to destroy everything they hold dear. The third electrifying book in The Wizards of Once series fizzes with magic and introduces us to a host of glorious new characters: bears and piskies and magical pins and needles to name but a few.
