Thank you Netgalley and William Morrow for an ARC of this book! This book took me several days to read, and it's not because I am a slow reader. Personally, it felt like I was reading for long periods of time without making much progress. Anyways, I said that to say that I struggled to get through the entire thing. The back and forth and different time periods kept me confused throughout most of the book. I liked the idea of the book, but I did not like the way things played out. I feel like the book lasted way longer than it needed to, and the ending could have been the same with less pages.

First off, I would like to thank NetGalley and the publishers for allowing me to read the eARC version of this book.

Absolutely WOW. I wish I could give this book six stars. I read a significant amount of fantasy and I often feel the books in this category tend to be more lovers angst instead of an actual plot that keeps a read on its toes. Gareth Brown absolutely killed it on the thriller and horror aspect of this book. The way the end played out and how the main character really showed her growth and intelligence completely blew me away.

I cannot wait to see another book by Gareth Brown.

If you enjoy fantasy than this book is for you!! It’s got time travel, the battles between good and evil and exhibits the superpowers of books! The characters are really vibrant and portrayed so vividly. I enjoyed the descriptions and how the magical system was built!

I really loved this one! So glad this was my first NetGalley read.
I really enjoyed the journey Cassie and her crew found themselves on. I was absolutely hooked and didn’t want to put it down.
The magical books and how they could be used. The journey through Cassie’s grief. The friendship between her and Izzy and the friends they make along the way. Just loved it and would absolutely read more!

A book full of wonder and magic, friendship and working for the bigger good. A beautifully written story full of twists, heartbreak and healing. I didn't want it to end and just want to crawl back into the magical world that Gareth created full of characters I won't soon forget.

I KNEW I was going to love this book, it was going to be my new Midnight Library... Wrong.

The first couple of chapters sucked me straight in, I really liked Cassie's character and found the Book an interesting concept. Then we meet Drummond, another character that has literally been hiding in the shadows... the Book of Shadows. We learn that there are several "Books", each with its own power... see? Interesting.

But then we move to a third POV and this is where I lose interest completely. Now the stories are feeling disjointed. I can't even remember the names in the third POV honestly, just that the story was boring, strange and random.

I had really high hopes for this, but it sadly let me down.

First off thank you so much to Gareth Brown and William Morrow for the eARC of this novel. Such an interesting book but still good. the middle of the story took me tad bit longer to get through then the rest but till a 3 star book! Not so much the genre I was hoping for when see the description. Would recommend to anyone who likes Scifi Thrillers.

Wow! That was a major rollercoaster. I ended up going with 3 stars, but not. because this book was average in any way. This book had major five star elements and major one star elements for me.

The plot was brilliant. I loved the story, wildly complex while still seeming to all come back together. Once I was about 20% into this book, I was hooked. I thought about it all day and couldn't wait to get home to keep going. I NEEDED to know what was going to happen next. I thought the pacing was good, and I really enjoyed watching all the different characters, timelines, and perspectives come together.

That all said, the characters were weak. One of my absolute biggest pet peeves is when men write a book full of incredibly self conscious women. Every two woman pair in this book had a conversation about how they "shouldn't eat that or it will go straight to their thighs". That is even worse to me than not passing the bechdel test and took me right out of the story and infuriated me. Not every bit of small talk between two women needs to be about getting fat like it's some awful thing. The female characters in this novel felt really flat to me. Even the relationship between the FMC and her best friend/roommate that was supposed to be so deep and important that its a major plot point felt flat and contrived. I think some of this comes from the extremely high number of perspectives we view the story from early in the book - I felt like I saw 20 different POVs in the first 20% so I wasn't really able to get to know any of the characters deeply. This improved significantly throughout the rest of the book, however I think that the depth of characters is often established in the beginning and this novel never recovered.

I was also underwhelmed by the villains origin story. For the whole book, I was waiting for the big reveal about who "the woman" was, and why she reveled in pain and suffering the way she did. And then it came and I was like....oh. Bummer.

Finally, the racist language in this book needs to be removed. There are much better ways to establish that a character is a dick than using slurs and racially derogatory language. I very well understood that Barbury was a bad man without him also being a racist. There is no subplot about racism or racial justice or any redeeming reasons for these words to be used, so it really felt like they were used for shock value and as an easy device to make the villain more villainous. This seems gross to me and it, again, took me out of the story.

Thank you to NetGalley for an ARC of this incredible book.

This was my first time reading an ARC, so my review may reflect my ignorance!

This book is magic: the passage of time and the human experience wrapped in a bow. By the end of the book, all loose strings had been tied, and I was very satisfied.

I would also like to give kudos to the author, who is a man, for writing a female protagonist so well. Cassie is a well-developed, fully formed character at the beginning of the book. Seeing her grow was marvelous.

My only issue with this book was the pacing. Without giving anything away, I felt that some very significant moments were brushed off quickly, while others were almost too drawn out.

Overall, finishing this book has been a magical start to 2024!

P.S. I’ve seen others say this reminds them of the Midnight Library. Everyone is allowed their own opinion, but I see little resemblance in the plots. This is a very unique book.

This book is a tough review for me. I had such high hopes and mixed feelings throughout, that ultimately left me ready for this story to end. This book was likened to many I’ve loved, and the unique book- themed storyline coupled with time travel sounded like something I’d love. In the end, it ended up being too much fantasy for me, more good vs. evil than time travel, and full of characters I wasn’t overly invested in. That all being said, I do think many will love this book- it just wasn’t right for me.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing this ARC.
I loved this book! It was so engaging, and I felt so immersed in the story the whole time I was reading it. This book gave me strong The Starless Sea and Piranesi vibes. The Book of Doors gives you just enough information for you to think you know what is going to happen and then something even better happens instead. The story came full circle wonderfully and left me very satisfied.

First, thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

To start with, the concept of the story is great. Magical books that give people super powers? I am here for it! The "good guys" are all likeable enough, though I'd like it if they were a little more fleshed out, and the "bad guys" are quite terrible. There are some genuinely horrific moments of violence and genuinely lovely moments of wonder, especially when Cassie and Izzy first figure out the power of the books. I love any book that understands the joys of travel and the delight of cozy bookstores and libraries. I can see how this will be a hit with a lot of people, and it feels cinematically written already. It won't surprise me at all if this is turned into a TV series or movie. It feels tailor-made for it. Plus, the ending is left wide open for more if the author chooses to go that route in the future.

I was all set to give it 4 stars until about halfway through the book. In the end, I went with three. I think I liked the idea of this story better than the actual story. Not to say the story was bad, but it just felt a little too clunky in places for me. Just as the story was picking up the pace, it slows down again. Time doesn't move at the same rate for all the characters, and it was hard to wrap my head around the dedication some of them had to each other over years after only knowing each other for a day or two. Likewise, the characters make some very poor and selfish decisions throughout the book that I found frustrating. I adore books, but if they are murdering people, I think it's perfectly reasonable to consider destroying them. That is taken off the table so quickly and so often it felt unrealistic to me. Better to have had the books magically survive attempts to destroy them or something than have characters just point blank refuse to consider destroying them, especially when we see characters perfectly willing to make so many other sacrifices for the sake of the books. Finally, without spoiling anything, the scene where we discover how the books were created just did not work for me. I didn't feel it made much sense, or was led up to enough throughout the story. I also felt that for a book that contained a lot of horror, the ending was a little too "Hallmark-y" for me. I felt the same about the book The Measure, and I feel like this book is aiming for a similar audience. I liked both books a lot at the start, but they wound up at 3 instead of 4 stars for similar reasons.

Overall, this was entertaining, and a lot of my issues with it were minor, but there were too many minor issues for me to rate it higher than a 3. It's worth a read if you want a quick magical journey and love books, but it didn't engage me on the level that my favorites do.

Although I am not a fantasy reader, this book caught my eye as the description was unique and interesting. There is some time travel involved, but the timeline shifts are necessary for the story and really keep things moving. I was invested in the leading character and her primary friendships, the amount of suspense was perfect, and the story was action-packed while pulling at your emotions at the same time. Overall, I enjoyed the storyline of this book.

Thank you NetGalley & William Morrow for this ARC!

3.5 rounded up to 4

I was back and forth with this book - the description sounded so good and interesting. This is not my usual book I read but I wanted to give it a shot. Once I picked this up the next day, I sometimes felt confused on what had happened prior. A few things that I didn't love about this book:
-Various names for the same people. Because the main villain of the story was just called "the woman," for almost half the book I thought she was the bookseller.. Also Drummond Fox was called various things - Fox, Drummond, and the Librarian. I just didn't see the need for this and it was confusing to the reader.
-There are so many story lines in this book. It was hard to focus on what was the main goal of this book and the characters. There's a huge fight/dramatic scene towards the end of the book but I still had 1.5 hours left to finish - it felt almost dragged on.
-The timelines/pace of this book was all over the place. A chapter could be 10 years and then another chapter was a few hours.

Besides the points above, I did like this book being in a different genre that what I usually read but felt like there were some holes missing. The overall concept was incredibly creative and I could tell a lot of work was put into this book I would suggest thing to my friends who fantasy.

This book was such a well written fantasy with settings that felt so immersive! I definitely recommend this to anyone who likes reading about stories with fun magic systems!

The premise of this book is really unique and interesting, and for the first third it was engrossing. However the story starts to feel all over the place and at times becomes difficult to follow. Feels like it was trying at times to be an epic but didn't really have the follow through. I was disappointed because I was so excited by the premise but let down by execution. It feels as though this could have used a little more time with an editor to flesh it out and smooth the pacing and it could have been a good read.

I would tell you that I am not a fantasy reader, yet here I am enjoying another fantasy-ish style book. I love when an author actually fully develops the characters. This seems like a simple statement, but you'd be surprised at the books I feel like this doesn't happen for. I also enjoy when a book makes me feel like I am on an emotional roller-coaster. I am not an overly emotional person so it takes fantastic writing to get me to that place. I also enjoy when there are highs and lows in a book (as that is life) and this book had just that plus everything in between. The author nailed the ending and I cannot wait to see if there is a sequel.

While I enjoyed the writing and thought the story was wonderful - the jump from POV to POV is a bit confusing and lost me at times. I love the concept of magical books and I believe this story has a lot of potential

United States Publication: February 13, 2024

Thank you to NetGalley and William Morrow for this advanced reader's copy. In exchange, I am providing an honest review.

On a snowy night, Cassie is gifted a special book from a dearly departed customer, Mr. Webber, at the bookstore she works at. The message at the front of the mysterious book is that any door is every door. When Cassie accidentally stumbles onto the meaning and powers of the book, a brand new world opens up to her. But the world is fraught with danger amidst the wonder of being able to travel anywhere she wants as long as there is a door nearby. When Drummond Fox becomes a part of the story, Cassie is thrown further into a world of magic. Her book is only one of many that contain magic and mystery and there are people out there who want to collect as many books as they can...but not for good purposes. Cassie joins forces with Drummond to put a stop to those who want the books to inflict pain and despair on humankind. And it turns out that the Book of Doors, the book Mr. Webber passed on to Cassie, is the key to everything.

A really impressive debut that keeps the door open (see what I did there?) for a book or two more to form a trilogy or perhaps a series. Brown explores the world of magic and time travel through special books. Some of the books mentioned, and used, in this title are the Books of illusion, matter (solids and liquids), shadows, pain, despair, joy, safety, and of course doors. From the author's acknowledgments and notes on the author, it is clear that Gareth Brown is enamored by time travel. I think it takes a lot of imagination, ingenuity, and cleverness to pull off a time travel book that reads and feels probable and Brown has done that. As a reader, I found his ideas plausible. Should Brown decide to write a sequel, a trilogy, or a series with this book as the first I will gladly be a follower.

Have you ever read a book where it left you amazed on how a writer can imagine such a world where books are magical and time is relative? I was so lucky to receive this book from Netgalley and thoroughly enjoyed every page of it. Cassie leads a quiet life, living with her best friend Izzy and working at a bookstore. When her favorite customer passing away in the store she finds a book with an inscription made out to her in front of him. Cassie soon finds that the book allows her to travel
To anywhere she wants and literally opens any door for herself. Cassie is thrust into a magical world where magical books exist and there are people who will kill to get their hands on these books. Cassie, along with a wonderful cast of characters finds herself in the ultimate battle of good vs evil that brings the reader on this super clever ride. I loved how all the pieces fell together and think the author did a masterful job with this story.
thank you to Netgalley and to the publishers for allowing me to read this advanced copy.