This is a well-written, entertaining, fast paced, fantasy novel. It has a likable and engaging female protagonist, an interesting and unique premise, books, magic, adventure, action, twists and turns, and a gratifying conclusion. Mr. Gareth Brown, William Morrow, and NetGalley kindly provided me with an advance reader copy of this fantastic novel, and this is my honest opinion.

I think The Book of Doors is going to be a really big hit for a lot of people! I’ve seen a lot of rave reviews. I loved the concept - a bookseller ends up getting a magical book that makes it so that she can travel through a door to anywhere she’s been. And there are other people who want that book back at any cost! Amazing setup!!

Unfortunately the execution is where it lost me. I wasn’t feeling invested enough in the characters. There was casual fatphobia that served no purpose at all. And ultimately whenever I put it down, I just didn’t want to pick it back up so this ended up a DNF for me. Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for the free ebook to review.

The Book of Doors has several things going for it. It’s a book about books and I love those. There are a lot of characters in the book and they’re all different enough that it’s easy to keep them straight, which is often not the case. The important books give the owner a special power and the thought behind their powers and how they work are really interesting. However, the details of the ability of the actual Book of Doors (I’m trying to avoid spoilers) and the origin of these special books don’t completely make sense to me. The explanations are either not clear enough or too complicated, perhaps both, and that takes away from the overall enjoyment of the book for me. The bones of the book and the idea are interesting but the execution still needs work for me.

I was given a copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

How would you like to have a book that would let you travel to any place or time?

I loved this magical story! It was an adventure from start to finish! I loved the friendship between Cassie and Izzy and the great cast of characters. The storyline flowed well and I hated for it to end. Fans of fantasy reads will love this story! I am looking forward to reading more by Gareth Brown. Thank you so much for the opportunity to read and review!

I enjoyed the opportunity to read this novel and found it to be exciting and compelling. The characters were well-developed, and I was anxious to discover the outcome of all of their adventures. The premise that there exist books that can magically impact the world is certainly an interesting idea for an avid reader, and the wonderful possibility that one could revisit moments of significance is exciting. This book gave the reader many lasting questions to ponder. If you could go anywhere, at any time period, where would you go and why? What could you learn from a past that you experienced once and choose to relive? Imagine how this skill could be used for the benefit of others? Or for personal gain? This is a thought-provoking fantasy, and I would enjoy reading more by this author.

The Book of Doors started a bit slow for me, taking several chapters before I was hooked, but once I was, I was fully on board for the ride. Some of the pacing felt off to me, having far too much detail on parts while being left wishing for more on others. I particularly wish the end where Cassie is ‘fixing’ things was longer. This seems a particularly ambitious accomplishment for a debut, and I had so much fun reading it.

Mr. Webber is a very compelling old man, who spends multiple evenings a week at a local bookstore. He’s become very fond of Cassie, who works there and has always been so kind to him. One evening when she is closing up, she notices Mr. Webber is very still and not responding. Sadness filled her as she calls 911. When the EMT took Mr. Webber’s body, Cassie found his books that were left behind. With them was a small leather book, and inside it said “This is the Book of Doors. Hold it in your hand, and any door is every door.” Mr. Webber had signed it over to Cassie. Each page is filled with words in other languages and different sketches of doors.
When she arrives home that night, holding the book in her hands, she is reminiscing with her roommate about the time she was in Venice, Italy. The cobbled stone streets, and the smell of freshly baked bread and pastries in the morning.
Still holding the book, when she gets up to walk through the door into the kitchen, it’s not her kitchen she sees. She’s gazing out at that same cobbled stone street in Venice she once was.
With a book so magical, surely she can’t be the only one who knows about it. What lengths would people go through to get their hands on it?
Things get complicated when Cassie loses the book and gets stuck 10 years in the past. And the only person she can think of to help her is Mr. Webber.

I loved how the MFC was able to travel to all of her favorite places that she reminisced about. The way the author describes the feeling made me want to hop on a plane right then and there.
I felt like this book was a tad bit too long and a little cheesy at some parts, but otherwise I enjoyed it and really liked most of the characters!

The Book of doors is a very unique and interesting premise. Different doors allow the owner to go/do different things, such as instantaneous travel to and these books are coveted by evil people. This gets very dark but will appeal to fantasy lovers.

Unfortunately the premise of this book was promising, but the motivations and momentum of the book didn’t feel fully fleshed out or have the tension it needed to propel the secret societies/urgency that the protagonist needed to fear.

Thank you NetGalley and William Morrow for an ARC. This book was not my jam. I will pick up any book having to do with books but this one was not great. There are a lot of inappropriate one liners throughout the book, including racist and body shaming comments that were completely unnecessary and could’ve been left out.

The time travel didn’t make sense to me, the book was very slow, and the characters have no depth to them. There were points in the book that it was really good and I was excited to keep reading but then it would just drag on. Overall, pretty disappointed because these are usually the types of books I would love.

I was drawn into this book from the beginning and love the idea of magical books that take you places. The first few trips that Cassie and Izzy go on are magical. It all quickly falls apart when they realize there is danger to using this book and there are other books. I really wanted to see more about the books and it just felt like a bit of jumbled mess when the villians of the story appeared. I really felt detached from the primary characters and really needed to care about at least the two original characters to make this book work since there was supposed to be such a powerful relationship that the book winds around. I felt that a lot of the disconnect was due to the language the author used in dialogue and the way the descriptions about the women were made. I really had to struggle to get through this book and had to come back to it several times. The end wrapped up nicely and was well layered for resolution, but ultimately this was not really enough. Thanks for the ARC, NetGalley.

Magical, beautiful, and such a mind warp.🤯 Incredible story and writing. Brown has a brilliant mind to make all the pieces fall into place. It’s a slow pace, but the beauty of the story kept me invested

Just finished "The Book of Doors" by Gareth Brown. It was a wild ride around NYC and many other places around the world. Cassie works at a bookstore and lives with her bestie Izzy (who used to work at the bookstore and is how the two of them met).

One night one of Cassie's customers (Mr. Webber) passes away just as the bookshop was being closed for the night. However, Mr. Webber leaves her a mysterious book titled *The Book of Doors*. Thus, the real premise for the story begins.

The Book of Doors allows access to any other door, across time and space, if you can imagine it. This premise is right up my alley, as someone who enjoys both sci-fi, travel, history, and historical novels. . I mean, who wouldn't want the power to step through doors to any destination or era they desire? I keep thinking of where I'd go first, and I can't make up my mind. :-)

While the book takes a bit to find its footing, once it does, it's like a roller coaster you don't want to end. The story's complexity and twists more than made up for it, making it an overall fantastic read.

For those who's read "The Midnight Library" should enjoy this book as well.

Big thanks to NetGalley for hooking me up with this ARC.

4 ⭐
0 🌶️

What an adventure. It was a bit of a slow start for me, but once I got a feel for the characters and the magic system I was fully invested. The concept started interesting but quickly became mind-blowing as other aspects came into play. Cassie and Drummond were sweet book nerds who had to dig quite deep to be the heroes of the book. I enjoyed how the author took two people who liked living in their books and the shadows and forced them to live their adventure and be more. The villains were horrible, really horrible and the good guys were real. The pacing seemed a bit uneven at times but as I said once I got a feel for the world it moved along very quickly. I was immersed in the storyline as Cassie went on her many poignant visits. The book was heart-wrenchingly moving at times. I believe this is a debut author and I categorize this as a heck of a great start and a wonderful urban fantasy.

Truly a magical book. The Book of Doors was hands down one of my favorite books of 2023. It has the aura of a classic and I have a feeling it might join the canon for fantasy. I almost had a strange sense of Deja Vu that the book already existed or perhaps always had, From the endearing to characters to the warm voice of the story, as well as a really interesting exploration of time bending, it provided deep enjoyment. For fans of Eva Ibbotson, JK Rowling, and Maggie Stiefvater - or really anyone who likes to cozy up to a good book. I’m terribly excited to see where Gareth Brown’s writing career takes him. What a brilliant debut.

This book was an early reader copy I received through Net Galley. All words are of my own opinion.

2 stars. Great concept and I had been looking forward to reading this, but the writing style sadly didn’t work for me at all.

The way this is written felt incredibly simple and juvenile. And so bland. Very few descriptions or explanations and those we did get seemed almost amateurish. Not very magical for a book about magic. I really struggled with it. I know many people enjoy this kind of writing; it just isn’t for me. It lacked personality!

Unfortunately, I felt the same way about the characters. They were flat, their motivations made no sense to me and there were no connecting moments to explain their choices. If you just found a magic book that lets you travel wherever you want to go—which you immediately use, by the way—you should have a reaction beyond something along the lines of “This is the best thing ever, but now I’m hungry, let’s go eat.”

The good guys, especially the two female friends, were annoying and the baddies resembled cartoon villains. The dialogue was atrocious and very much fell into the category of “People don’t talk like this!”

After introducing all the important characters, the plot went in a direction that didn’t interest me at all. I might have been able to get on board with it if I hadn't felt like I was fighting the stylistic writing choices with every page read. I wanted to enjoy a magical and immersive story all about the power of books, but regrettably, it was not to be.

This book sure did not disappoint. I went in not knowing what to expect but exceeded my expectations. This is a unique read and I would try to go in with very little knowledge. If you love time travel books, be sure to pick this up. It is an adventure read with magic sprinkled throughout.
3.5 stars

SPOILERS. A good book. I almost bailed with some of the European travels at the beginning... a little too tedious, but I'm glad I didn't. I enjoyed reading it, and the explanations and examples of time travel were great. Some notes, male authors don't need to comment on female characters' looks. Drummond was "bedraggled" and "gaunt" but we got SO many more descriptions of Izzy, Cassie and the woman. Just unnecessary. Especially as the same type of descriptions were not afforded any male characters. Another note, not everything has to be explained. I appreciate the magic being fully explained so that it could solve problems, but Cassie didn't need to create the books.

With magic books, violent sociopathic villains, puppy-dog romance, and cozy reading corners
“The Book of Doors” by Gareth Brown - (4 Stars) (Pub Date: 2/13/2024) is a great story, with amazing magic, time-travel, and “wish-it-were-true” adventure.

Good Things: Brown does an excellent job of stepping a reader directly into the magic, and then through the complexities of that magic with excellent world-building. The magic books, the doors, and the conflict of the story were interesting, and I wanted to know more about them, the history, and the world of magical books that came before this story and what might come after. I particularly liked the explanation of the theories on time-travel, and the simple demonstration of those theories. Time travel in narratives can sometimes be too complicatedly scientific or demonstrably difficult to follow along with, OR they are so simplistic that a reader is asked to just trust that all things just work out and not ask too many questions about how. The Book of Doors keeps it light and accessible.

Opportunities: There were a lot of characters, and they had a lot of opportunities to shine, but I feel like the author invested all of his creativity on the world, and the magical mechanisms so that when the characters had to live in that universe and talk to each, the writing took a pretty definitive dip. This had a LOT of potential to be a five star, ‘knock me off my feet’ story. But instead I felt like the characters weren’t terribly believable, and the way they talked to each other was stilted and uncharacteristic of the age and life experiences we were supposed to believe they had lived. The villain was amazing in concept, but felt completely disjointed from the rest of the characters. I just didn’t really believe that these people would talk and act the way that they did and that was a little disappointing because I REALLY liked the magic. Like a lot.

Final Thoughts: This book was still a solid 4-star read because of the world, the magic, and the action, but I really felt earnest disappointment when I realized that the characters I had, were all that I was going to get. The sense of imbalance was unfortunate, as was the fact that the characters (in their 20’s-30’s and up) talked like my middle-schooler. BUT STILL…read it and dream of doors, and books, and magic all through our world.

I appreciate the opportunity afforded me to have an early read of this story by netgalley and William Morrow. The opinions in this review are expressly those of ButIDigressBookClub and are intended for use by my followers and friends when choosing their next book. #butidigress #butidigressbookclub #thebookofdoors #bookofdoors #magic #timetravel #garethbrown #netgalley #netgalleyreviewer #arc #arcs

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Review Shared on Goodreads - www.goodreads.com/leah_cyphert_butidigressbookclub
Publishing Review 2/10/2024

I just need to know if there is goin to be more to this story because you cannot leave us here! You don’t need to explain magic of books to book lovers. The difference in this story was these books were truly magical. They could take you to different times, inflict pain on others, push you into despair, protect you from all harm, give you joy and many other things yet to be known.

Cassie was presented with a book by one of the usuals of the bookstore after his unexpected passing in the store. It was the Book of Doors and it said any door is every door. While it took bit of time for Cassie to actually understand what that actually meant, she got to experience the magic of this book. She was naive as she wanted to use this book to skip her walk to the bodega. However, dangerous people around her would thought her a lesson very fast.

The variety of the characters and their development arches were impeccable. Storytelling was captivating as I didn’t want to put the book down not even to eat. You will feel all sorts of feelings reading this story. One hell of a debut!