I’m not what you would call organized when it comes to choosing what book to read next. My TBR stack changes with the day, with what catches my eye when I look at the bookshelf or swipe through my Kindle. It can change immediately when something new by one of my favorite authors debuts, or when someone I trust suggests something. In this particular case, my last read of 2020 happened because my son, a high school English teacher with just about the same taste in books as me, told me that I would absolutely love The Ten Thousand Doors of January.

Thanks, Eric, because damn if you weren’t right. This might be my favorite novel of the year.

The Ten Thousand Doors of January is a portal fantasy that ranks with the very best of that genre (from older classics like The Chronicles of Narnia to new classics like Seanan McGuire’s Wayward Children series). It’s also a heart stopping adventure, and a towering love story that spans multiple worlds. It tells the story of January Scaller, a young woman in the early 1900s who finds a mysterious door, and an even more mysterious book, that draws her into a story that will change her life completely.

I don’t want to say anything more about the plot, as one of the joys of The Ten Thousand Doors of January is following the wondrous twists and turns of Harrow’s novel. Suffice to say that I was enthralled from beginning to end. Harrow is a first-rate storyteller. She creates characters who, whether you love them or hate them, are fully realized and complex. There are good people who are also deeply flawed, and downright evil people who believe in their hearts that they are doing the right thing. Those characters populate worlds both familiar and strange, and it’s here that Harrow’s use of language is fully on display. She’s an unparalleled stylist. I found myself rereading passages, not just for the sheer joy of it, but to see if I could figure out just how she was pulling off her word magic.

The other touchstone that guides The Ten Thousand Doors of January is family, both the ones we’re born into and the ones we create for ourselves. Harrow is at her best here, digging deep into the various relationships that give the novel its heart. There are moments of true love and true sorrow, and it all rings true.

One other thing. Harrow has the mechanics of her story worked out beautifully, the science behind doorways, her version of portals, perfectly believable. As I was reading the novel, I found myself looking out of the corner of my eye, hoping to find my own doorway, and my own adventure.