A Man Came Out of a Door in the Mountain

When the devil comes to visit Leo’s unnamed mountain town, he and his friends are too preoccupied to notice. Bryan and Ursie live alone after their mother’s death and are struggling to support themselves. Tessa lives with her deadbeat sister and a brood of nieces and nephews who all rely on her for their care. Jackie works in the kitchen of a logging camp, a thankless job and backbreaking work. And Leo’s storyteller uncle is slowly dying. Each caught up in their own obsessions, it’s easy to miss the warning signs, the unease inspired by a milky-skinned stranger, the bizarre behavior of a visiting magician. Their lives fall apart on blazing summer day as fires rage in the mountains.

Part legend, part myth, A Man Came Out of a Door in the Mountain reads like poetry. Each carefully chosen word falls like a pebble in a lake, sinking into the reader’s consciousness, inspiring unease and a vague disquiet. The book’s only flaw is that there’s not more of it. I wanted to read more of Uncle Lud’s stories, and I definitely wanted to unravel the mystery of the disappearing girls. Sadly, Harun keeps her cards close to her chest; we’ll never find the door in the mountain.