A Door in the Dark

by Scott Reintgen

One of Us is Lying meets A Deadly Education in this fantasy thriller that follows six teenage wizards as they fight to make it home alive after a malfunctioning spell leaves them stranded in the wilderness.

Ren Monroe has spent four years proving she’s one of the best wizards in her generation. But top marks at Balmerick University will mean nothing if she fails to get recruited into one of the major houses. Enter Theo Brood. If being rich were a sin, he’d already be halfway to hell. After a failed and disastrous party trick, fate has the two of them crossing paths at the public waxway portal the day before holidays—Theo’s punishment is to travel home with the scholarship kids. Which doesn’t sit well with any of them.

A fight breaks out. In the chaos, the portal spell malfunctions. All six students are snatched from the safety of the school’s campus and set down in the middle of nowhere. And one of them is dead on arrival.

If anyone can get them through the punishing wilderness with limited magical reserves it’s Ren. She’s been in survival mode her entire life. But no magic could prepare her for the tangled secrets the rest of the group is harboring, or for what’s following them through the dark woods…

• ISBN10: 1665918683
• ISBN13: 9781665918688
• Publish Date: 28 March 2023
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: Margaret K. McElderry Books
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 368
• Language: English

Reviews

[lisbethwhite]

Okay, so before we start, please know that Scott Reintgen is an auto read for me, thanks to the Nyxia trilogy. I LOVE his writing.
This book was no exception. If you've read Nyxia, you'll see some thematic similarities - a group of teenagers thrown together to survive, lots of different kind of relationships within the group, not all of them making it to the end (Reintgen is happy to kill characters you love, thanks we hate it). This story is set in a modern-feeling high-fantasy world, and the main group of characters is socio-economically diverse. SO, if you like fantasy but get tired of the olden-timey Renassance Faire feeling, this might be for you. Honestly, I'll probably shove this at kids who want adventure/survival stories, as that is the bulk of the story's plot. Note, this is ABSOLUTELY set up to be at least a duology, maybe more. I'm not mad about it at all, and then end isn't a cliffhanger that makes you want to throw it across the room, so I feel like I can wait a little more easily for the rest of the story.
My KNEA RC review:
Six students from a magical boarding school are headed home for a break, when things go very very wrong. Instead of home, they find themselves lost in a dangerous wilderness, facing a grueling trek to get home. As a group, they have enough skill, knowledge, and probably enough magical stores to make it, if nothing else goes wrong. But, of course, nothing is ever that easy or straightforward. Hand this to readers who love magical schools, wilderness adventure/survival, and subtle treachery.