72 pages • 2 hours read
Alix E. HarrowThe Ten Thousand Doors of January
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2019A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Chapters 11-12Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 11 Summary: “My Mother’s Door”
January finally makes it to Ninley, Kentucky, and finds the Larson farm, where her mother grew up. By now, she is truly a vagabond, and realizes she’s who she always wanted to be: “my seven-year-old self […] would’ve been rather taken with my seventeen-year-old self” (311). When Aunt Lizzie opens the door and sees January, she mistakenly identifies January as Ade at first. Aunt Lizzie has been waiting all these years, hoping Ade would come back. She tells January stories about Ade as a girl, and that she wishes she and her sisters had never sold the hayfield.
As January recounts her childhood to Aunt Lizzie and talks about visiting Kentucky as a child in 1901, she realizes Lizzie said the property buyer also visited in 1901. All the pieces fall together. Locke is the one who met Ade at church, asked her about the ghost boy from another world, bought the property, and closed her mother’s Door. All this time, Locke knew about the Larson farm and the Door on the property. When January opened the blue Door as a little girl, he could have told Julian how to get back to Ade, but instead destroyed it.
January suddenly remembers the letter she sent to Locke. She had written, “I’m going home” (323), thinking he would assume Japan was her destination, but instead he would know that she came here, to the field in Kentucky. January flies out the Door, apologizing to Aunt Lizzie, and promises to return.
Chapter 12 Summary: “The Ash Door”
Locke stands in the hayfield waiting for January when she arrives. Even though she knows he is her enemy, January still feels the need to be polite, holding out hope that he cares for her. However, her manners fall away when she sees the pile of ash that used to be the blue Door; he knowingly destroyed the way back to her family.
Locke maintains a normal façade, and is not the villain January expects. He sees himself as January’s savior and benefactor, but January now understands that in raising her, he was just collecting her. He never loved her. Locke thinks his work closing Doors protects the world and maintains order and progress. He came from another world fraught with war and destruction, and has magic powers to “sway men’s minds” (332) with his words. When January was a child, he used his power to bend January’s will, and for years has used his ability to acquire wealth and power. Locke reveals that his jade cup also has magic power; it extends his lifespan. He has been alive for two centuries, and is the Founder of the Society who has been working to destroy Doors from the beginning. He has also recruited others such as Havemeyer and Ilvane to join his cause in the name of safety and prosperity.
Locke also used his power to erase Samuel’s memory of the Doors, January, and Samuel’s feelings for her. Locke doesn’t recognize the cruelty involved in bending someone’s mind and will, and violating one’s mind. When January sees the remains of her diary in the dirt and a piece of charcoal, she begins to write and resists Locke’s mind controlling power. She knows that worlds are meant to be free and open, not “suffocating and safe” (340), and that the Doors aren’t meant to close forever. Locke aims his revolver at Bad, but January takes the bullet in the shoulder when she jumps in front of Bad to save him. Numb to the pain, January writes in her own blood: “She writes a Door of ash. It opens” (342). She steps through the Door, followed by the sound of a gunshot.
Chapters 11-12 Analysis
Harrow’s writing style, such as her uses of point of view and foreshadowing, creates a tone of mystery that keeps the reader guessing. For example, January addresses the reader directly, saying, “Maybe I’ll tell you about them, someday” (316). This statement reminds the reader that January is writing this story for a specific intended audience, and makes the reader wonder who that person could be. Harrow also gives small clues and uses foreshadowing so that the reader can put together the full story about Locke and the Society alongside January. For instance, in January’s conversation with Aunt Lizzie, the women discuss the selling of the hayfield and the man who bought it who never seemed to age. This particular clue connects to earlier in the novel when January noticed her father showing signs of aging while Locke remained youthful. Many other connections and hints throughout the novel make it possible for the reader to guess details of the story. Uses of foreshadowing and point of view keep the reader engaged in solving the mystery, and create a cohesive narrative while revealing just one detail at a time.
January finally accepts Locke as the villain he has been all along. Although a small part of her still wants to believe he loved her, she realizes all he cares about is keeping his power. Locke maintains a calm façade and thinks the Society’s work closing Doors benefits the world, but January sees that he fears losing his power to someone from another world. Harrow again highlights the power of words, but this time shows the destructive influence words can have. In January’s eyes, Locke’s power to bend one’s will through words is, “a species of violence far worse than Havemeyer’s” (337). All her life, Locke forced January to be someone she never wanted to be, and only now is she rediscovering the parts of her identity that he took away. By highlighting Locke’s cruelty, Harrow shows that the evillest villain is not the one who can do physical harm, but the one who can do mental harm by taking away one’s free will and identity.
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By Alix E. Harrow
