Gareth Brown debuts with a riveting tale of adventure, magic, and the long process of grieving.
Cassie Andrews, a mild-mannered bookseller in New York City, inherits the mysterious eponymous volume from a deceased customer. Discovering its magical ability to transport her to any place she envisions, Cassie, accompanied by her spirited roommate, Izzy, embarks on an adventure. However, as they realize the perilous potential of the book, they find themselves entangled with an enigmatic man known as the Librarian, who protects a collection of similarly magical books, and pursued by malevolent forces seeking the power of the Book of Doors and all the other volumes like it.
Brown conjures a magical atmosphere that filters through even the plot’s more mundane moments while also expertly handling difficult themes of loss and pain.
With an endearingly quirky cast and a lightning quick pace, this is sure to suck readers in.
https://www.publishersweekly.com/9780063323988
Ok, so you might have to bear with me for this review because I enjoyed this book, but also… didn’t. Yes, I don’t really know how else to explain it, there are a few things I can pinpoint that I will talk about, but the rest was just a feeling I got, so I’ll apologize in advance.
So… the characters, there are a few of them and we do get multiple POV’s, but the main one, and the one I enjoyed the most was Cassie, the woman who originally finds the Book of Doors and sets the whole story into motion. Cassie is incredibly easy to bond and empathize with. Not only because she loves books, but because she’s someone all alone in the world, no parents, grandparents, no family to speak of except for her best friend and roommate Izzy. I think what made me really enjoy her character though was that Brown didn’t make her the usual hero style type, the one who would give everything up to save the world. She’s complicated, layered, a little selfish in parts, and because of this she reads as more realistic. We also have Drummond Fox, Librarian and the first person to stumble upon Cassie with the Book of Doors. His character is shrouded in a little mystery, we want to trust him, but also feel he has ulterior motives, and I enjoyed how his POV didn’t just flesh the world out, but also took us back to some moments in time that were pivotal to the story.
What Brown does incredibly well is draw a clear line between the ‘good’ characters and the ‘bad.’ While the likes of Cassie and Fox may not be wholly good, they are certainly better than The Woman, the mysterious figure who spends the book doing everything in her power to get her hands on the Book of Doors, as well as others. She is someone whose story is kept close to the chest, someone we never learn much about, not until the end of the book anyway, but she is vicious with no moral code, willing to do whatever it takes to gain as much power as she can. There are other characters who get POV parts, some you will like and others you will hate, but there was one character who I felt went a little OTT to the evil side. He almost read like an evil comic villain, you could imagine him sitting there twirling in a chair stroking his cat, and I think he could have been much more sinister without some of the language and actions that he used.
I do feel like the writing style took me out of the story a little in parts, it never seemed to move with the story at all, rather stayed the same: a bland, almost simplistic style the whole way through, so the parts of the story that should have been high octane and filled with danger didn’t really hit as much as they could have done. I also felt like the way it was written almost left a gap between the reader and the character; it was hard to develop emotions for these characters when there was little to no emotion on the page, and if you know me, I am 100% a character-over-plot reader, so you know the plot was good for me to have finished this.
The use of time travel in this story was done exceptionally well, in fact, the use of the Books in general was brilliant and I do feel like Brown got the perfect balance of the high-octane vs the slower scenes. It’s a dark story, and there are certainly scenes that are not for the faint of heart, but the time travel is where this book really shone for me. I loved how parts of the story almost came round a full 360 through it, and I also enjoyed how it was used to add both emotional and tension-filled twists. Despite the lack of emotion and depth in the writing, some of these scenes certainly still hit, and some absolutely gave you those edge of your seat, nail biting moments.
The ending was both a hit and a miss for me, and I still can’t decide which side it falls on, in fact I still can’t quite decide if I loved this book, of if it felt more of a meh read for me… I did warn you this would be a mixed review! I rated it 4* because the bits I enjoyed I loved, but I did feel there were parts that let it down and, had those been fixed, it could have been a truly amazing read.
https://crooksbooks.blog/2024/01/15/the-book-of-doors-by-gareth-brown-arc-review/
Interview by Daryl M.
Gareth Brown wanted to be a writer from a very young age, and he completed his first novel as a teenager. For the last twenty years, he has worked in the UK Civil Service and the National Health Service while writing in his spare time. When not working or writing, Gareth loves traveling, especially the whirlwind first few hours in a new city and long road trips through beautiful landscapes
I’d had the idea for a 'book of doors' that could turn any door into every door for a long time, but I’d always imagined it as a device that would suit a fantasy novel, something a wizard might have. I don’t write fantasy, so I never really did anything with it. It was only during the Covid pandemic, when travel was restricted, and I couldn’t go anywhere that I found myself wishing I had a ‘book of doors’ so I could open my study door and just be somewhere else. That was really the genesis—what would happen if there was a book of doors in our contemporary world? What sort of person would have it, and what would they do with it?
I don’t think so. I do sometimes use a real-life person as an inspiration for the look of a character—for example, the physical description of Lund is based on a real-life person—but the characters themselves are usually entirely a product of my brain.
The Woman was interesting because it took me a long time to work out who (or what) she was. I think I understood The Woman when I realized that she would say very little. To me, there is something terrifying about a villain who reveals nothing about their thoughts. I wanted the woman to be silent, mysterious, and terrifying, almost like a force of nature, a storm that blows in unpredictably and causes devastation.
It changed hugely. I don’t plan at all, and when I started, I had only the very first scene and I knew nothing else that would happen. As I write, I prefer to discover the story as it is much more like reading a book. That can be thrilling, but it can also lead to lots of plot problems. For a long time, the character of Drummond Fox had a completely different motivation and back story, and it was only very late in the writing process that I discovered the idea of Drummond’s hidden library. That seems unbelievable now because it is such a central feature of the plot. I didn’t lose any characters or scenes. If anything, scenes were added during the edit because my publishers wanted more of certain things—more of the back story with Drummond’s friends in the library, for example, or more scenes showing just how evil The Woman is.
It has to be The Book of Doors itself. That is where the novel started, it was the first book that occurred to me. I love traveling, but I hate airports and airplanes, so The Book of Doors would be just perfect.
The one thing I love more than traveling is eating, so I think I would spend the day going to my favorite places to eat my favorite food! I would start with breakfast in Malaysia, where my wife is from, perhaps with a curry laksa at a restaurant near the beach in my wife’s hometown. Then through a doorway to Tokyo for a wander around Shinjuku for a few hours before we find a place for ramen or sushi for lunch. And then I think we’d have to end the day in New York City, watching the lights come on as the sky darkens. We’d have dinner in a deli, maybe 2nd Avenue Deli, which is one of our favorites, and then home for a cup of tea in front of the television before bed!
Yes. The Library is heavily based on a hotel in the north west Scottish Highlands called The Torridon. It’s a beautiful red stone building set in fabulous surroundings. I unashamedly stole it as the inspiration for Drummond’s home.
Tea. All day, every day. I am not a coffee drinker. Tea is just better in every way. I know that might be controversial to my coffee-loving friends in America, but I will die on this hill.
I have learned a lot about how busy everyone is in publishing! Also, how many different steps there are in the process between manuscript and published book. I knew, of course, that the book would be edited, but I didn’t know about the many different rounds of edits the book would go through. The promotion and marketing side of things has been a learning curve—having to promote myself and the book through short videos, podcasts, and Q&As—I have loved it, but I can well appreciate that for many people, it would be daunting. I would say to other writers that if you want to be a published author and if you want as many people as possible to read your book, you have to engage with the commercial and promotional side of things. You may feel more comfortable as an artist and a creator, but as a published author, you are part of a commercial business.
Two books, that I am starting almost simultaneously: The Book Eaters by Sunyi Dean, and Damascus Station, a spy thriller by David McCloskey who is a former CIA analyst. I’ve heard great things about both.
I didn’t read a lot as a child, I only really started reading properly as a teenager. But I used to love the Asterix comics—are they available in the US?—I would borrow all of them from my local library. They were so witty. I also remember loving children’s editions of both Dracula and Frankenstein long before I read the full novels.
I’ve watched a lot of excellent television over the last few years—it seems like the quality of programs is getting better and better (although you sometimes have to hunt to find them gems). One of the things I’ve watched recently that affected me most was a British program called The Detectorists. It is a comedy-drama about two friends who are metal detectors. It was very, very British, with lots of shots of the beautiful English countryside, gentle humor, oddball characters, fabulous music, and a lovely bitter-sweet feel. I loved it.
More recently my wife and I have just finished watching Severance and that was superb. A fabulous high-concept idea executed really well. I am looking forward to seeing what they do with the second season.
My perfect day would probably start in a nice hotel in a big city—London or New York or Tokyo. My wife would be there, and we would spend the day wandering the streets and exploring, stopping in cafes for cups of tea and slices of cake. And then an evening meal in a fabulous restaurant. Maybe a massage thrown in at some point to ease the aches and pains? And, of course, books and bookshops scattered generously throughout the day.
Can I give you a million pounds? Of course, my answer would be 'Yes'! More seriously…I would love to be asked to write an episode of Doctor Who. I don’t know if I would have the confidence to do actually it…but I would think about it very seriously!
I have just recently finished a draft of what I hope will be my second novel—it has gone to my agent and will shortly go to editors to see if they like it. With that done, I am happily doing nothing! I’ve written five novels in the last two-and-a-bit years so I am taking a break for a few months to enjoy the publication of The Book of Doors.
https://www.lapl.org/collections-resources/blogs/lapl/interview-author-gareth-brown
Gareth Brown wanted to be a writer from a very young age, and he completed his first novel as a teenager. For the last twenty years he has worked in the UK Civil Service and the National Health Service while writing in his spare time. When not working or writing, Gareth loves travelling, especially the whirlwind first few hours in a new city and long road trips through beautiful landscapes. He enjoys barbecues, patisseries, playing pool, and falling asleep in front of the television like an old man. Gareth lives with his wife and two impudent and highly excitable Skye terriers near Edinburgh in Scotland. The Book of Doors is his first published novel.
Author’s website: https://www.garethbrownbooks.com/