The Ten Thousand Doors of January

Yule drifts between unconsciousness and flashes of awareness that people around him are tending to his wounds. As he heals, he eventually wakes to find a wealthy-looking man sitting next to him: Locke. Locke informs him he is the one paying for his comfort and medical attention, as well as taking care of his baby. Based on rumors, Locke knows Julian came from another world, and heard he has been, “raving about doors and different planets and a woman named […] Adelaide” (223). Locke offers him room and board, unlimited resources for travel, and employment. This will allow Julian to search for a Door back to Ade in exchange for bringing rare and powerful objects to Locke for his collection. Locke also promises to take care of January and keep her safe.

Desperate to find a Door back to Ade, Julian takes Locke’s offer. In his travels searching for Doors, he sees both the good and evil in the world. Julian feels he has become a “story-eater” (227), scavenging and stealing objects from other worlds for Locke’s collection. As the years pass, Julian knows he is running out of time. January is growing up. He feels guilt over his absence from her life, as well as fear that when he finally finds Ade, she will be angry with him for leaving January fatherless her whole life.

In hindsight, Julian realizes that he didn’t notice Doors closing behind him because of his focus on his own pain throughout his travels. Unbeknownst to him, some type of disaster always followed his return from other worlds that destroyed the Doors. Julian worries about what the world would be like without any Doors. He feels it will stagnate and resist change. Now that he knows Doors are closing, he secretly finds one Door that remains open as an escape route for January and Jane in case something happens to him. He tells January to follow Jane if she needs a place to hide. Julian shares that he wrote this book because he believes words are powerful, and hopes that someone can fight back against the people who are closing the doors.

In a postscript to January, Julian reveals he found a Door to the Written in Japan. He thinks the Door-closers will find him, which is why he plans to send the book through the chest that has a twin in Locke’s house. The gifts January has been finding in the chest all her life, such as the diary, came from her father. Finally, Julian asks for her forgiveness; he says he will go through the Door to the Written hoping January can make it there someday too and join him and her mother. A few lines later, he says he cannot bring himself to leave January again. Instead, he will return to Locke House for her. His letter ends with a hastily scrawled, urgent message: “Run January / Arcadia / Do not trust.” (239).

Jane and January bury Havemeyer, but know that others will come looking for them. January realizes that the Society must be coming behind her father, closing Doors in order to keep their power, but questions who could have closed the blue Door in the hayfield when she was seven.

Jane continues to tell January the story of how she met her father. Julian came through the Door into her forest world one day, and she almost shot him, thinking him an intruder. However, when she realized he spoke English, the two sat down together and traded stories. Julian warned Jane that Doors were closing behind him, and advised her to return to earth to avoid becoming trapped in her forest world. Jane decided to return to earth temporarily to search for her sister, and Julian camped outside the Door to guard it. When Jane returned to the Door, dynamite exploded, destroying the Door. Jane only survived because Julian shoved her out of the way of the explosion.

Jane misses her community and family dearly, and wants January to write her a Door back to her home, but January feels that she needs to be in the place where the “worlds rub together” (247) in order to create a Door to a different world. She also recognizes that opening the Door to escape from the asylum almost killed her, and doesn’t think she would be able to open a Door between two worlds.

Meanwhile, Samuel recovers, and January tells him all she knows about Doors, her parents, and the Society. Samuel and Jane both recognize that the Society will still come looking for January, and they are in danger. Jane announces that Julian told her Arcadia would be a safe place to hide, and she will lead them to the Door. January suggests they ask Locke for help, convinced he loves her, but Jane and Samuel scoff at her naiveté. Samuel tells January he wants to go with her “for always” (254), but January feels afraid to let herself love him, since all the people she has loved have left her. Jane leads the journey to the coast of Maine, where the Door to Arcadia waits. They row out to a patch of rocks on the ocean, find the Door within a lighthouse, and step over the Threshold into a world of wide plains and open skies.