The best books with portals for children and young adults

Steve Griffin Author Of The City of Light
By Steve Griffin

Who am I?

For me, portals have always been the ultimate analogy for the imagination, particularly the untrammeled imagination of youth. We can go anywhere in our minds and portals are a way we make it happen more ‘literally’ in books (in themselves a kind of portal, too). I’ve been hooked on portals ever since reading CS Lewis as a boy. As a grown-up, I discovered a fantastic garden of hedged rooms in Herefordshire and imagined each room holding a portal to a sacred place across the planet. Imagine if you only had to step outside your door to go somewhere amazing – but then found a killer was using the portals too…

I wrote...

The City of Light

By Steve Griffin,

Book cover of The City of Light

What is my book about?

Lizzie Jones expects nothing but boredom when she moves with her mum to the cottage she’s inherited, deep in the English countryside. But then, with the help of her little dog, she discovers a magical portal to Kashi, the Indian City of Light, hidden in the cottage's garden. But Lizzie’s disbelief and wonder at the portal soon vanish as she begins to suspect a mysterious intruder might be the notorious killer, Pisaca of Kashi, using the portal to evade capture.

Lizzie must act – but what can she do?

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The books I picked & why

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

By C. S. Lewis, Pauline Baynes (illustrator),

Book cover of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

Why did I love this book?

Perhaps the most iconic of all portal fantasies, The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe firmly established the trope of children discovering a new world of wonders and terrors through an innocuous, everyday item. This story of a land of humans and talking animals under the spell of the Winter Witch is truly epic, but the scene that puts a spell on me is far more intimate – Lucy’s pushing through the clothes in the old wardrobe to emerge into a snowy forest with a street lantern and a friendly, parcel-clutching fawn by the name of Mr. Tumnus. 

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

By C. S. Lewis, Pauline Baynes (illustrator),

Why should I read it?

27 authors picked The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Lucy steps into the Professor's wardrobe - but steps out again into a snowy forest. She's stumbled upon the magical world of Narnia, land of unicorns, centaurs, fauns... and the wicked White Witch, who terrorises all. Lucy soon realises that Narnia, and in particular Aslan, the great Lion, needs her help if the country's creatures are ever going to be free again...

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Coraline

By Neil Gaiman,

Book cover of Coraline

Why did I love this book?

A portal book that’s properly spooky. Frustrated like every child by her parents, Coraline opens a door she’s been warned not to open and meets her Other Parents in an adjacent apartment. The Other Parents are just like hers except they have buttons stitched over their eyes (I mean, what? If you aren’t freaked out by the idea of that…!?) A fabulous novella that’s much more than creepy, as we discover the true feeling between Coraline and her parents and even her compassion for the Other Mother.

Coraline

By Neil Gaiman,

Why should I read it?

14 authors picked Coraline as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

"Sometimes funny, always creepy, genuinely moving, this marvellous spine-chiller will appeal to readers from nine to ninety." - "Books for Keeps". "I was looking forward to "Coraline", and I wasn't disappointed. In fact, I was enthralled. This is a marvellously strange and scary book." - Philip Pullman, "Guardian". "If any writer can get the guys to read about the girls, it should be Neil Gaiman. His new novel "Coraline" is a dreamlike adventure. For all its gripping nightmare imagery, this is actually a conventional fairy story with a moral." - "Daily Telegraph". Stephen King once called Neil Gaiman 'a treasure-house…

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The Golden Compass

By Philip Pullman,

Book cover of The Golden Compass

Why did I love this book?

Northern Lights is the first book in the His Dark Materials trilogy, a dazzling series in which portals enable movement between parallel worlds including a steampunk version of our own and the strange, desert city of Cittagazze. It features one of the niftiest magic items ever conceived in the form of the Subtle Knife, which can divide subatomic particles and create new portals. How cool is that? Northern Lights with its gypsies, zeppelins, and armoured bears in Arctic snowscapes is my favourite of the trilogy.

The Golden Compass

By Philip Pullman,

Why should I read it?

21 authors picked The Golden Compass as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The first volume in Philip Pullman's groundbreaking
HIS DARK MATERIALS trilogy, now a thrilling, critically
acclaimed BBC/HBO television series. First published
in 1995, and acclaimed as a modern masterpiece, this first
book in the series won the UK's top awards for children's literature.

"Without this child, we shall all
die."

Lyra Belacqua and her animal daemon live
half-wild and carefree among scholars of Jordan College, Oxford.

The destiny that awaits her will take her to the frozen lands
of the Arctic, where witch-clans reign and ice-bears fight.

Her extraordinary journey will have immeasurable consequences
far beyond her own world...



This…

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Tom's Midnight Garden

By Philippa Pearce, Jaime Zollars (illustrator),

Book cover of Tom's Midnight Garden

Why did I love this book?

A gentler book, exquisite in its handling of the relationship between quarantined Tom and Victorian girl Hatty, whom he meets in the garden of his aunt and uncle’s house when the clock strikes thirteen. This book came second in the all-time Carnegie vote in 2007 – which shows how this tale of friendship with its perfect ending has truly stood the test of time.

Tom's Midnight Garden

By Philippa Pearce, Jaime Zollars (illustrator),

Why should I read it?

5 authors picked Tom's Midnight Garden as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Winner of the Carnegie Medal

From beloved author Philippa Pearce, this sixtieth-anniversary edition is the perfect way to share this transcendent story of friendship with a new generation of readers. Philip Pullman, bestselling author of the His Dark Materials trilogy, called Tom's Midnight Garden "A perfect book."

When Tom's brother gets sick, he's shipped off to spend what he's sure will be a boring summer with his aunt and uncle in the country. But then Tom hears the old grandfather clock in the hall chime thirteen times, and he's transported back to an old garden where he meets a young,…

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The Lightning Thief

By Rick Riordan,

Book cover of The Lightning Thief

Why did I love this book?

A fabulous blast and a great introduction to Greek mythology. Percy’s dyslexia and ADHD are causing him problems at school and when one of his teachers morphs into a monster his mum takes him to a special camp on Long Island where he can learn who he truly is. The riotous quest that subsequently unfolds takes Percy across the United States and to two of the best portal locations ever – Mount Olympus (on the 600th floor of the Empire State) and the DOA Recording Studios in Hollywood, which gives entry to the Underworld.

The Lightning Thief

By Rick Riordan,

Why should I read it?

13 authors picked The Lightning Thief as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The Lightning Thief: the First book in Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson series.

The first bestselling book in Rick Riordan's phenomenally successful Percy Jackson series.

Look, I didn't want to be a half-blood. I never asked to be the son of a Greek God. I was just a normal kid, going to school, playing basketball, skateboarding. The usual. Until I accidentally vaporized my maths teacher. That's when things started really going wrong. Now I spend my time fighting with swords, battling monsters with my friends, and generally trying to stay alive.

This is the one where Zeus, God of the Sky,…

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