Character page for Wayward Children.
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Eleanor West's Home for Wayward Children (spoilers for all books before Mislaid in Parts Half-Known!)
Eleanor West
Eleanor West
The founder of the titular home. Once a constant traveler to a Nonsense world in her youth, she now harbors other kids who got kicked out of their Magical Lands and want to return while waiting to become senile enough to go back to her own world again.
- Cloud Cuckoo Lander: Is very eccentric and always wearing colorful outfits. Justified Trope, considering that she went to a high Nonsense world.
- Cool Aunt: Well, great-great-great aunt to be specific, but she is this to Kade who accepts him with open arms in contrast to his transphobic family.
- Cool Old Lady: She is a spirited and eccentric 100-year-old woman who created a place that validates many children's experiences in Magical Lands and helps them adjust to coming back to our world.
- Daddy's Girl: The reason she travelled back-and-forth to her world was that she couldn't just break her father's heart by going away forever.
- Older Than She Looks: Many students were surprised to learn that Eleanor is nearly 100 years old, instead of just an energetic 60-year-old. Time passed differently in the world she traveled to and it permanently slowed her aging.
- Reasonable Authority Figure: She keeps a cool head during the murders of Every Heart a Doorway and doesn't suspect Nancy, Christopher and Jack of being the culprits just for being from "creepy worlds".
Nancy Whitman
Nancy Whitman
The main protagonist of Every Heart a Doorway. She is a seventeen year-old girl who went to the Halls of the Dead and served as a Statue for the Lord of the Dead, who told her to return only if she was sure. Due to her parents interpreting her change in behavior as trauma of being "kidnapped", they send her to Eleanor West's Home for Wayward Children in hopes of "fixing her".
- The Bus Came Back: We see her again in Beneath the Sugar Sky when Christopher, Kade, Cora, Nadya, and Rini go to the Halls in the hopes of resurrecting Sumi. There, she apologizes them for never saying goodbye.
- Charles Atlas Superpower: Her time working as a Statue in the Halls of the Dead strengthened her muscles and let her decelerate her heartbeat to the point of near-immobility for long periods of time.
- Convicted by Public Opinion: Is afraid of the school turning against her and expelling her for believing she's behind the murders due to her being from an underworld land and the killings happening right after she started to attend the school.
- Dark Is Not Evil: She went to an underworld-type land and despite people's suspicion, she has nothing to do with the murders at the school.
- Deer In The Head Lights: As a hold over of her time at the Halls of the Dead she becomes immobile whenever she's anxious or afraid. It helps her to be unnoticed by Jill when Nancy sees the latter walking through the campus covered in blood.
- Eerie Pale-Skinned Brunette: Is this due to her time in the underworld.
- Home Sweet Home: She finally returns to her home (aka: the Halls of the Dead) at the end of the first book.
- In-Series Nickname: Is called "ghostie girl" by Sumi.
- Locked into Strangeness: While dancing with the Lord of the Dead, he ran his fingers through it and all the hair around the touched hair turned white out of jealousy.
- Meaningful Name: "Whitman" is an English name meaning "white man."
- Not So Stoic: Much to her dismay, she still tends to emote, like being flustered when Sumi implies that she dyed her hair or when meeting Kade, being devastated with the idea of never coming back home, or when the murders start to happen.
- Signature Headgear: Her pomegranate-red ribbon.
Onishi Sumi
Onishi Sumi
Nancy's roommate. A hyper girl who went to the Nonsense world of Confection, where she spent ten subjective years until being exiled for transgressions against the Countess of Candy Floss. She was sent to Eleanor West's Home for Wayward Children, where she remained, as her family did not want her back until she acted "proper" again.
- An Arm and a Leg: Her hands are cut off by Jill and she dies of blood loss in the first book.
- Back from the Dead: Comes back from the dead in Beneath the Sugar Sky.
- Beware the Silly Ones: Don't be fooled by her hyper and Cloud Cuckoo Lander behavior. She can still be very brutal. Eleanor paired Nancy up with her to protect Nancy from hazing from the other students, because no one wants to mess with Sumi.
- The Chosen One: She was prophesied to return to Confection and overthrow the Queen of Cakes, establishing a benevolent monarchy in her place.
- Cloud Cuckoo Lander: As a High Nonsense traveller, she exudes this trope.
- Conveniently an Orphan: Her parents died years ago, making Eleanor her official guardian which means there's no one to question her death.
- Genki Girl: She's very hyper and fast and never stopped moving.
- Girlish Pigtails: She keeps her hair in these despite being a teenager, adding to her childish attitude.
- Motor Mouth: She talks really fast too.
- Nice Girl: Despite her bluntness and lack of regard for social norms she is shown to be rather kind.
- No Social Skills: Blunt and with zero sexual taboos. She knows how to behave properly, she just doesn't care.
- Sweet Tooth: Coming from a world that was literally made of sugar, she consumes a nigh-inhuman quantity of sweets with every meal, including mixed in with savory dishes.
- You Can't Fight Fate: Justified — she knows she'll return to Confection and overthrow the Queen of Cakes because, in some sense, thanks to Confection's unusual flow of time, she already has. As such, she's entirely confident that her Door will find her at the right time.
Kade Bronson
Kade Bronson
Kade spent several years in the world of Prism before his fairy patrons realized that the "girl" they'd chosen as their champion was actually a transgender boy and promptly threw him out. Since neither the world he traveled to nor his parents accept him for who he is, Kade plans to spend the rest of his life at Eleanor's school, helping other lost travelers.
- Child Soldiers: While many worlds have child heroes, Kade fits the tragic archetype more than the exceptional one. He was used by the fairies, forced to kill the only person who genuinely loved him, and then callously tossed aside for not being "perfect" enough. He fully plans to spend the rest of his life at Eleanor's school because he never wants to return to Prism.
- My God, What Have I Done?: Was tricked into killing the Goblin King, the first person to recognize him as himself and to show him kindness. When he briefly returns to Prism in Mislaid In Parts Half-Known, he's so wracked by guilt that he almost considers staying and being executed for the crime.
- Older Than They Look: Time didn’t pass on Earth while Kade was in Prism, and when he returned he found that the aging he’d experienced while in Prism had been reversed. At the start of the series, he looks like a teenager and is chronologically in his early twenties.
- Sufficiently Analyzed Magic: He took the current Compass of worlds, reclassified it, and refined it by adding minor directions, and is the most interested in investigating Nexi (worlds that connect to other worlds). In Mislaid in Parts Half-Known, he officially takes over world classification from Eleanor.
- Supernaturally-Validated Trans Person: The fairies’ decision to kick Kade out was not to his benefit, but it did represent their acknowledgement that he’s not a girl. The Goblin King also recognized him as a boy before he had consciously realized this about himself.
Jacqueline "Jack" Wolcott
Jacqueline “Jack” Wolcott
Along with her sister Jill, Jack traveled to the high Logic/high Wicked world of the Moors, where she studied a magical and ruthless brand of otherworldly science. Her acerbic manner and clinical attitude towards life and death make her a misfit at Eleanor’s school. Jack is introduced in Every Heart a Doorway and is a main point-of-view character in Down Among the Sticks and Bones and Come Tumbling Down.
- The Apprentice: She was an apprentice to Dr. Bleak, assisting him in the practice of science and medicine in the Moors.
- Deadpan Snarker: She has a bitter, dry wit.
- Mad Scientist: Apprentice to one, and eventually takes his place.
- Terrified of Germs: Due to a childhood where she was forbidden from getting dirty and an adolescence spent working in a sterile science lab, Jack hates uncontrolled exposure to any possible organic contaminant.
- Tomboy and Girly Girl: Jack goes by a masculine nickname and dresses in pants, vests, and bow ties, in contrast with her sister’s frilly dresses. As Jack explains to Nancy, she and Jill were forced into the opposite roles by their parents, with Jack expected to be quiet, delicate, and feminine while Jill was pressured to be outgoing, ambitious, and athletic. The roles they took on in the Moors were in some ways a deliberate repudiation of the roles their parents imposed on them.
Jillian "Jill" Wolcott
Jillian “Jill” Wolcott
Along with her sister Jack, Jill traveled to the Moors, where she joined the court of a powerful vampire. Jill is introduced in Every Heart a Doorway and is a main point-of-view character in Down Among the Sticks and Bones.
- Nothing Nice About Sugar and Spice: Jill wears elaborate frilly dresses, strives to behave like a refined lady, and killed several people to earn her place at her Master's side.
- Tomboy and Girly Girl: The aristocratic, elaborately-dressed girly-girl to Jack’s tomboy.
- Vampire Wannabe: Jill wants nothing more than to become a vampire and live forever at her beloved Master’s side.
- Voluntary Vampire Victim: Jill willingly fed the Master during her time in his court.He is not so different from the boys she had been dreading meeting when she started her high school career. Like them, he wants her for her body. Like them, he is bigger than her, stronger than her, more powerful than her in a thousand ways. But unlike them, he tells her no lies, puts no veils before his intentions...
Christopher Flores
Christopher Flores
Christopher traveled to Mariposa, a world where the dead are reborn as living skeletons. There, he fell in love with a Skeleton Girl and learned to play a magical flute.- Ill Boy: He originally had cancer, which the Princess of Mariposa cured him of by concentrating all of it in a single bone, extracting it, and replacing it.
- Magical Flutist: Christopher's flute has magical powers, the least of which being keeping him alive and keeping his cancer from spreading. His music can animate the dead and is inaudible to the living.
- Nightmare Fetishist: A benign version in that his one true love, his ideal of beauty, happens not to have any flesh on her bones. It's not a problem for anyone and he looks forward to their happy reunion, but he once muses that he would have all the makings of a Serial Killer in different circumstances.
- No-Sell: He's completely unaffected by Seraphina's Glamour because the Skeleton Girl is the only one for him.
Katherine Lundy
Katherine Lundy
Lundy is a teacher and counselor at Eleanor’s school. In her teens, she made a bargain with supernatural forces in order to stop aging and retain access to her door to the Goblin Market. The deal backfired, leaving her trapped on Earth in a body that ages backwards. Lundy is introduced in Every Heart a Doorway, and the story of her portal journey is told in In an Absent Dream.- Merlin Sickness: She ages backwards at one-quarter rate.
Cora
Cora
Cora traveled to the Trenches, a watery world where she lived among merpeople. On Earth, she’s shy and insecure about her weight. She is the main point-of-view character in Beneath the Sugar Sky and Where The Drowned Girls Go.- Friendless Background: She was bullied and isolated at school for being fat.
- Interrupted Suicide: She attempted suicide due to bullying, only for the door to the Trenches to take her.
- Mental Health Recovery Arc: In Where the Drowned Girls Go, she is haunted by the Drowned Gods who possessed her in Come Tumbling Down, and must learn to fend them off.
- Our Mermaids Are Different: She's described as a mermaid who "wears her scales on the inside now". The only outward indication is her naturally blue-green hair.
- Stout Strength: Cora is a great swimmer and runner who resents people assuming that she’s weak or lazy because she’s fat.
- Weight Woe: Cora is insecure about her large size due to having been bullied for it throughout her childhood. In the Trenches, where body fat is a valuable defense against the cold water, she was considered naturally strong and beautiful.
Nadya
Nadya
Nadya is a Russian girl who traveled to Belyyreka, the Drowned World.- Artificial Limbs: Nadya was born without a right forearm. In Belyyreka, she used a hand made out of water.
- Catchphrase: “I’m not [however someone just described her]. I’m a Drowned Girl.”
Antsy
Antsy
Antsy ran away from home and ended up in the Shop Where The Lost Things Go, a place teeming with secrets and Doors to other worlds. She is the main character of Lost in the Moment and Found and has a major role in Mislaid in Parts Half-Known.- Dimensional Traveler: Far more so than any other student thanks to the Shop, a "nexus world" that attracts huge numbers of Doors. She spends two years there visiting more than three worlds per day, and gains a permanent knack for navigating Doors.
- I Choose to Stay: She returns to the Shop in Mislaid in Parts Half-Known to help set things right by running it more fairly and honestly.
- Only Known by Their Nickname: Her full name is Antoinette Ricci, but she generally prefers Antsy, especially after running away.
- Reports of My Death Were Greatly Exaggerated: Her stepfather was convicted of her murder during her disappearance. The story attracted enough media attention for Christopher to have seen it on the news.
- The Runaway: She flees home at age seven out of the (accurate) fear that her stepfather will sexually assault her and the (inaccurate) belief that her mother wouldn't believe her. After returning to Earth, her own mother doesn't recognize her, so she finds her own way to Eleanor's school.
- Scarily Competent Tracker: Her time in the Shop gives her this ability to an outright metaphysical degree — when she's looking for something, she can find a path to it by Gut Feeling alone, even if it's worlds removed from her.
- Trauma Button: Since her father dropped dead in a well-lit Target store while she was nearby, she refuses to go there and once wets herself rather than be forced through the doors.
- You Can't Go Home Again: The Doors age her to the point that her mother doesn't recognize her. However, she holds out hope that they can be reunited in the future when the disparity between her physical age and actual age isn't as obvious.
- Younger Than They Look: She uses the Doors enough over two years to leave her a nine-year-old in a sixteen-year-old body. In addition to the devastating loss of her childhood, this makes it hard for her to fit in at Eleanor's school, since she's developmentally far behind where teachers and classmates assume her to be.
Seraphina
Seraphina
Seraphina is a long-term resident of Eleanor's school, first encountered in Every Heart a Doorway. Her Door left her mind-breakingly beautiful and deeply bitter.- Blessed with Suck: In Mislaid in Parts Half-Known, she bluntly breaks down how her Glamour has made it impossible for her to have a normal life or form genuine relationships — she can hand in a blank paper and still get perfect grades, or insult people to their faces and still make them adore her.
- Face of an Angel, Mind of a Demon: People under her influence will eagerly put themselves down in comparison to her, and he's just as eager to put them down.Jack: The girl's a rancid bucket of leeches on the inside, but she has a face that could move angels to murder.
- Freudian Excuse: She's a mean, cruel person with a Glamour that forces people to adore her. The glamour was inflicted by her kidnappers in order to make her a more beautiful prize; she knows it's depriving her of genuine relationships and life experience, but she can't turn it off, so all she wants is to return to a world where people aren't so strongly affected.
- Glamour: The sight of her impossible beauty entrances people, forcing them to admire her and do whatever they think she wants.
Other Characters on Earth
The Wolcott Family
Chester & Serena Wolcott
Jack and Jill’s parents.- Abusive Parents: They raised Jack and Jill in an emotionally stifling environment where they were treated more like status symbols than human beings.
Louise “Gemma Lou” Wolcott
Jack and Jill’s grandmother, who lived with them for the first five years of their lives.- Cool Old Lady: She cared very much for Jack and Jill, and appreciated their individuality when their parents did not.
The Lundy Family
Mr. Lundy
Katherine’s father, an elementary school principal.- Hero of Another Story: He also traveled to the Goblin Market as a child, but has nothing to say about it other than to warn Lundy to stay away.
The Moors (spoilers for Down Among the Sticks and Bones and Come Tumbling Down)
The Master
The Master
An ancient vampire who rules over a town in the Moors.- Affably Evil: The Master has a polite demeanor, is generally honest with his foundlings about his expectations and the rules of the Moors, and upholds his responsibilities as a feudal lord. He is utterly ruthless if crossed, and the townspeople are terrified of provoking him.
- Evil Mentor: To Jill. He's the one teaching her how to be a vampire.
- The Master: It's in the title. He's in charge and if he has a name, he doesn't care to speak it.
Dr. Bleak
Dr. Bleak
A human scientist who lives and works near the Master’s town.- Genre Savvy: Realizes his job as the slightly less monstrous Anti-Hero who rescues Jack from a far worse monster in The Master.
- Mad Scientist: He has all the trappings of one, like a lab filled with monsters preserved in jars and the ability to resurrect the dead via lightning, but he’s actually a pretty level-headed guy.
Alexis Chopper
Alexis Chopper
A young woman from the Master’s town who becomes Jack’s first lover.- Back from the Dead: Resurrected with lightning and mad science twice — first when she kissed a ghost girl, second when Jill killed her. Death Is Cheap in the Moors, but the second resurrection takes a lot out of her.
- Big Beautiful Woman: Alexis is a full-figured woman who is a main character’s love interest and is regarded as very beautiful by her community, to the point that her parents were worried that her looks might attract a vampire’s interest.
- Locked into Strangeness: She has a white streak in her dark hair from the touch of a ghostly lover.
Confection (spoilers for Beneath the Sugar Sky)
Onishi Rini
Onishi Rini
Sumi’s daughter, a native of Confection who traveled to Earth to prevent a time paradox caused by her mother’s death on Earth.- Fading Away: Rini is in danger of this due to Sumi’s paradoxical death.
- Like Mother, Like Daughter: Like her mother, Rini is blunt, energetic, and outgoing.
- Naked First Impression: Rini arrives on Earth naked and doesn’t understand why this makes anyone uncomfortable.
- Technicolor Eyes: Her eyes are the color of candy corn.
Ponder, the Candy Corn Farmer
Ponder
A native of Confection who was Sumi’s lover and Rini’s father.- Non-Action GuyPonder: I never saved the day. I never challenged the gods. I was the person you could come home to when the quest was over, and I’d greet you with a warm fudge pie and a how was your day, and I’d never feel like I was being left out just because I was forever left behind.
The Queen of Cakes
The Queen of Cakes
A powerful figure in Confection and Sumi's prophesied nemesis.- God Save Us from the Queen!
- Lean and Mean: Takes pride in having stayed thin in a world made out of sugary foodstuffs.
The Goblin Market (spoilers for In an Absent Dream)
The Wasp Queen
The Wasp Queen
A dangerous being who lives on the outskirts of the Goblin Market. She is mentioned in In an Absent Dream and appears in the short story Juice Like Wounds.- Was Once a Man: She was a portal child like Lundy and Mockery, but she became a monster due to isolating herself and refusing to participate in the Market.
