Every Heart A Doorway

McGuire uses the fraught parent-child relationships in Every Heart a Doorway to examine the tension between familial expectations and individual needs. From the novella’s beginning, the readers know with certainty that the students traveled to other worlds despite their families’ insistence to the contrary. Thus, the story’s fantasy elements are a way to illustrate how parents sometimes refuse to accept aspects of their children’s identities and lived experiences that veer off the paths they envision for their children. These restrictive expectations lead the parents to either label their children’s transformative adventures as a traumatic tragedy, like Nancy’s supposed kidnapping, or to pathologize them as a mental health condition, “a rare but not unique disorder that manifests in young girls just stepping across the border into womanhood” (12). This lack of understanding explains why the students’ homes are no longer with their biological families in any meaningful sense and why going back to their parents is feared as “the worst thing that could happen to anybody” (105). Even the parents who profess to love their children hurt them by imposing expectations instead of accepting that their children have changed.

Through characters like the Addams twins, the author establishes that the portal worlds offer children an escape from their families’ damaging expectations. Jack describes how the arbitrary labels that the twins received from their parents negatively impacted every aspect of their lives: “Ever watch a pair of perfectionists try to decide which of their identical children is the ‘smart one’ versus the ‘pretty one’? It would have been funny, if our lives hadn’t been the prize they were trying to win” (79). Their parents’ limiting views led Jack and Jill to seek freedom and belonging in another world, ultimately setting the stage for the murders that Jill commits in an effort to rejoin her chosen father figure, the Master.

Kade offers an important perspective on this theme because he came to understand and embrace his gender identity during his time in Prism. His family doesn’t want to acknowledge how he has changed, and they have barred him from returning home unless he conforms to their outdated understanding of him: “They know exactly what they’re missing, and since she’s never going to be found again, they don’t know what to do with me” (147). Kade’s story reveals how parents’ refusal to accept change can sunder children’s relationships with their families. As a result, he must satisfy his need for belonging by fostering community at the school where he has an aunt and friends who accept him for who he is. Because their families refuse to accept their children’s truths, Kade and his fellow students are forced to meet their needs elsewhere.

Nancy’s evolving resistance to familial expectations and eventual acceptance of her individual needs shape her character arc. At the start of the novella, her parents dismiss her needs and inflict emotional harm by pressuring her to dress and act the part of their “little rainbow” (27). The protagonist is certain that her parents “would never understand” how her time in the Halls of the Dead has changed her (166). Because Nancy’s needs and her family’s desires are incompatible, she seizes her happy ending by permanently escaping from their expectations and returning to those who understand her. Every Heart a Doorway explores the tension and harm that results when parents refuse to adjust their expectations in light of their children’s needs.