Pick the Lock

Gr 9 Up–Sixteen-year-old Jane lives in an old Victorian house with her family, their cook, and their gardener. Jane’s mother, Mina, is a famous punk musician in the band Placenta. Yet, when Mina isn’t out on tour, their home life is anything but idyllic. Jane’s father, Vernon, has confined Mina to the System—a series of pneumatic tubes running throughout the house that she watches her family through. Since homeschooling Jane and her younger brother, Henry, during the pandemic, Vernon has chosen to keep them home, creating an elaborate and rigid set of rules. When Jane stumbles upon a stash of security camera footage that dates back to before she was born, she begins to see the dysfunction and abuse happening in her family. With a new perspective, Jane starts to write a punk opera and works to save her mother from the System. Along the way, Jane finds her voice, gets herself back to high school and her friends, and fights against Vernon’s abuse. As typical of King’s work, this novel blends realism, fanciful, and genre to create a young adult feminist anthem that thoughtfully addresses issues of abuse.