There Is a Door in This Darkness by Kristin Cashore
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Web ID: 18496941Beautifully written and emotional
There is a Door in this Darkness follows Wilhelmina Hart, whose high school years began with the election of Donald Trump (the monster) and ended with the onset of the COVID pandemic. It is 2020, on the verge of the election, and Wilhelmina has deferred college for a year. She is stuck in a small apartment, with too many people, helping her siblings do online school. She is struggling with grief for one of her beloved aunts who died from cancer. There is a Door in the Darkness is a complex story about grief, isolation, change, mental health, friendship, and family. This book accurately captures the feeling of 2020, the horrors of the Trump presidency and COVID. It's eerie to read because we are currently on the verge of another election, four years later, when the threat of the monster remains, and people are still dying from COVID. There are magical elements to the story, but they did not seem to come to any conclusion. There is a Door in the Darkness is a beautifully written and emotional story.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Quite amazing
I have enjoyed all of the author's books. They are well crafted and engaging. This one reminded me of the feel of A Wrinkle in Time by Madeline L"Engle. I mean that as high praise. This is, I think, the first book I've read that puts the reader right in the middle of the craziness of 2020 when our whole world shifted. Cashore d ives right into to the pandemic and the election without sugar coated either of them. It's all well done and quite captivating.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
It Was OK
768 reviews 21 followers April 5, 2024 I think that a lot of people will definitely relate to the feelings that Wilhelmina and her family and friends have during this period of time. They had already lived through the ignorance and insanity of the Trump presidency and the election is coming to hopefully create some change. There has been a lot of hate, uprising, and subjugation that has made the world feel dangerous and unaccepting for anyone that is not white. The book highlights the protesting and the difficulty for marginalized groups to be able to cast their vote in the election with the mail ballot issues. In this book, Covid is just another challenge that Wilhelmina has to face after the death of her beloved Aunt Frankie. After the background is presented about Wilhelmina's life, I really struggled to be invested in the story. There was a lot of discussion about her chronic pain issues that became repetitive and seemed to take over the book. I think the author stays true to the time, however doesn't really create anything super compelling that was a must read.
Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Lame
I won this book in a Goodreads Giveaway for my honest review. I'd have to say I was disappointed in this book. It's a no from me. A big miss. This could have been a good story but the author failed to deliver one. I kept reading giving the benefit of the doubt, but it never had a good rhythm. Instead of getting g better it just got worse and worse. If the story stayed with Wilhemina more and the magic she was seeing around her and the love of her Aunts it might have been good. Instead the author couldn't stop talking about politics and the 2016 presidential run including Donald Trump. If it wasn't about politics it was of all the things to hate about the Covid pandemic In 2020. Shut downs, masks, and the isolation of it. It felt more like a memoir of the authors frustrations between 2016 and 2020 than a fictional story. Which ruined the whole book. Not one bit of entertainment or excitement anywhere in this book. Don't waste your time with this one. Worst book I ever read. I give this one an F for failure.
Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Not For Me
Unfortunately, this book just wasn't a great read for me personally. That's just my personal preference though, and others may (and have) found enjoyment. Naturally I knew that this novel would be about politics, but after a while, it felt a bit repetitive for my tastes. I understand the characters' (and author's) reasons for having such passion about the topic, but it got to be a bit too much for me in terms of enjoying the book. I thought politics was going to be a subplot, but it took up the majority of the story (even with other things going on like the COVID pandemic and loss of a loved one). So whether I as a reader agree or disagree with what's being said, it was rather distracting after a while and ruined the pacing. I appreciate that this book was solidly and confidently set during the pandemic though, as I haven't seen many books that do that (especially for teens). Overall, I don't think it was a terrible book. Just not what I was expecting.
Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Coming of age
I need to start this review with saying I think it’s too soon to be immersing myself in books/movies/television that is based around the pandemic. I understand for some writing/creating based on that will heal them, but I read to escape and the pandemic isn’t a place I want to escape to. That being said I liked this book even if I had a hard time reading it. This was definitely a book I put down often and if it wasn’t one I’d found on BookishFirst I may not have finished it. I liked the magical realism in this book. I liked the characters even if the lack of communication between Wilhelmina and her friends was painful. I loved James and his push to talk about what was happening. I didn’t love the combination of the election and pandemic. Those things sucked beyond all words and I don’t need the reminders. The writing was good, but I thought the flashbacks were too long and there were too many mentions of the election. While I loved that he was referred to as the Monster I didn’t think he needed quite so many pages dedicated to him and his hissy fits. I think I would enjoy other things by this author more and maybe I would have enjoyed this book in a few years. I gave it 3.5 stars and rounded up since I think it might have been more of a me problem.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Magical contemporary
There is a Door in This Darkness is the first book by Kristin Cashore that I read that wasn’t Graceling—as many of you know, I’m a huge fan of the Graceling series! At first, I wasn’t sure if a contemporary YA was for me, but the description of this book being about magic had me really curious—how is something both magical and contemporary?! Also, this book is about grief, and that is something that does tend to draw me in, having had my fair share. TIADITD reminded me so much of the movie Big Fish (based on a book by the same name, that I’ve not read) because in a seemingly ordinary world, magic abounds and coincidence and connection sweep the MCs on a journey of discovery—and, in Wilhelmina’s case, overcoming loss and finding love. This book also deals with the COVID Pandemic and the 2016 and 2020 elections, so basically this book is heavy, and yet it’s filled with light—both literal and figurative. It was kind of interesting to me that I didn’t always like Wilhelmina, she was often selfish, grouchy, and irrational, and yet I loved her journey, and I also enjoyed how she found her way out of those frustrations that I felt with her. I also loved the cast of characters; I feel like each one was well-rounded and solidly developed and the book would not have been the same without each and every individual side character because they all affected Wilhelmina and her adventure in different and important ways. James was, of course, my favorite—who doesn’t love a doughnut-slinging MLI who seems fated to enter one’s life? In the end, I give this book five stars; but I will say the political commentary—while I wholeheartedly agree!—came off a little too pointedly to have felt natural on the part of the narrator, and I think would have felt less forced had the book maybe been in first person POV or the language been only used by the characters.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Magical Realism in the Pandemic
While I sometimes struggle with stories that one might call "manic pixie dream-books," I feel like this particular one works on several levels. It's about such a surreal time, focusing around the 2020 election, back when we were still acknowledging the pandemic. Several times while reading this, I thought of Ryka Aoki's "Light From Uncommon Stars," and not just because of the donuts. While Uncommon Stars has a much higher dose of magical realism, both books walk a line between metaphor and surreal fantasy, with a lot of quirky strangeness mixed with just enough sincere emotion for ballast. Wilhelmina's relationship with her aunts, a polyamorous throuple, is so sweet and sincere, although I did find that Esther and Margaret spoke in a way that sometimes made them interchangeable. Frankie is much more distinct for reasons that will swiftly become obvious if you read this. Overall, the dreamy, strange, Alice In Wonderland-ishness of this book was sometimes a struggle for me, but I don't often read books that are as firmly rooted in contemporary events of the recent past, and I think this book will have special meaning for people born in the early-2000s who experienced the weird, seismic shift of lockdown during their high school years. As for people who are currently teenagers, I'm not sure if the book will have the same meaning, but this definitely dredged up A Lot of Feelings(tm) for me about a time that, in retrospect, seems almost unreal. Also: if you're someone who cries when books get political, just keep moving. Thanks to Bookish First for the ARC copy; my ramblings are my own.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com