Books number 4,5,6,10,11,12,13,20 and 21 of this year were The Wayward Children Series by Seanan Mcquire. There are nine books currently in this series, with more being released still.
If you’ve been paying attention to my read count over the reviews I’ve done this year and noticed number’s that are missing, mystery solved, it was this series.
A summary attempt
In this world there are doors to other places, children find these doors to fantastical realms that call to something in them that they want, but what a child wants, isn’t necessarily what is good for them. The doors will only keep them if they are sure they want to stay. For the ones who are unsure and find themselves returned to reality but cannot let the world beyond their door go, there is Eleanor West’s Home For Wayward Children. This is school is designed to help them re-adjust until their door comes back to claim them, or they accept their place back in the real world.
The books hop between stories set at the home and telling the stories of the kids lives, how they found their doors, what they went through in their door’s world and how they came to Miss West’s home.
What did I think?
I loved this series, it is heartbreaking, like, I cannot emphasise enough how it took my little heart and stomped on it. I listened to them all as audios, they are only four hours each and some of them are even read by the author themself. These stories are visually beautiful and just heart-achingly tragic, all the characters are well rounded and each story is completely unique but follows an over-arching narrative. The world’s each of the children belongs to are incredibly rich and all the stories explore the ways in which children are let down by the adults in their lives from the just plain abusive, to accidental neglect and unfair expectations.
Antonia Bernardin 
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