My son and I were lucky enough to attend Chicon 8, the 80th World Science Fiction Convention, in Chicago in 2022. We had a wonderful time, and perhaps the high point was being there for the awarding of the Hugo Awards. That year, Seanan McGuire took home the Hugo for best series, for her masterful Wayward Children series. I could not have been happier.
Beginning with Every Heart a Doorway, the Wayward Children series of fantasy novellas tell the stories of the children who have traveled through magical portals to fantastic, often dangerous worlds, and then returned to our own, ending up at Eleanor West’s Home for Wayward Children, a sort of boarding school for the returned. McGuire blends fantasy with horror, fairy tales, mystery and more into some of the most original coming-of-age fiction ever written. This is portal fantasy at its absolute finest.
Through Gates of Garnet and Gold is the 11th novella in the series, and McGuire shows no signs of her imagination and superlative storytelling flagging.
Nancy, who we first met in Every Heart a Doorway, returns to Eleanor West’s from the Halls of the Dead, where she’s been happily spending her time as a living statue. A mysterious darkness has been attacking and killing her fellow living statues, and Nancy as returned to seek help from her former classmates. Alway up for a quest (although they’re specifically forbidden), Nancy and her friends’s friends join her and they embark on a journey back in an attempt to save the world she loves.
Like all the Wayward Children books, Through Gates of Garnet and Gold is populated with wonderful characters we’ve come to know, love, and sometimes hate, from previous installments. As good as McGuire is at creating utterly original settings, I think what makes her work truly special is her characters. They are unique, unforgettable, and heartbreakingly human, even the ones who no longer technically are.
Through Gates of Garnet and Gold is a more than worthy addition to McGuire’s ongoing story. I hope the Wayward Children series never ends.
Dave Writes and Draws 
What a wonderfully heartfelt and insightful appreciation of Wayward Children. ✨
Your love for the series shines through every paragraph, and the way you connect the experience of attending Chicon 8 with the joy of seeing Seanan McGuire win the Hugo Award makes this feel deeply personal and genuine.
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