THE DOOR THAT LED TO WHERE by Sally Gardner was chosen as Book of the Week in the Times at the weekend, which was brilliant – and we have the perfect quote: “(it) captures the mood of a generation.”
Seventeen-year-old A J Flynn is not the apple of his mother’s eye. He has failed all but one of his exams and his future is not looking too rosy. So how is it that an eminent law firm chose him above others to take up a position – albeit very junior - and why is it that the people there seem to know things about his father that he does not? Then one day, as he is sorting out the archives, he comes across a key which has his name and date of birth on it. Who has planted this key and how can he find the door… So begins AJ’s extraordinary journey in time and place.
This is a mystery, a murder mystery, set in present day London but also in the 19th century which is a very real and tangible past that three lost boys stumble into and find to their intense surprise and delight that whereas our world seems to value them so little, the world of the past is welcoming, rewarding and not a little seductive.