Every Heart a Doorway

Every year some children vanish through hidden doors into other worlds: bright, silly lands of candy and rainbows, or strict, logical worlds, or dark, gothic places ruled by vampires and mad scientists. Some of them come home again, and their families want them to be normal. Eleanor West, who once traveled through a door herself, runs a boarding school where these children are understood and allowed to long for the places they lost.

Nancy arrives after years in the Halls of the Dead, a silent kingdom where she learned to stand perfectly still for days. Her roommate is Sumi, a chaotic girl from a nonsense world, and she quickly meets Kade, who was sent away from a fairy kingdom, Christopher, who carries a bone flute, and the twins Jack and Jill, who came back from a land of vampires and mad science. When a student is found murdered and others follow, suspicion falls on the newcomer, and the children must work together, using the strange skills their worlds gave them, to stop the killer.

Compact, atmospheric and full of memorable lines. About 176 pages, the first of a series of Wayward Children novellas.