The Thin Door
In a world that is both madly wrong and perfectly NORML, the kid in the red hoodie rides a beater bike through the unplanned ride of her life. Slipping through the Thin Door, she enters a world where wolves have swallowed the grandmothers, and she is on her own to figure out how to find her way home.
Let's Talk About Being NORML
NORML is everything that leaks into your head from the daily opinion, and sits there like a fact. NORML is the story everybody has about you, which is Not Only Real, Mostly Lies.
So when Ramie Wirth says, “I will not swallow their story like a happy pill. I will not be a NORML,” she is in for a wild ride, in two competing, intertwined stories.
Here in the ordinary world, in an ordinary city, sophomore Ramie just wants a better story for her life than the impossible one she was born into. But her decision to slip out of her ordinary life leads to consequence and danger, and what she doesn’t know is that she is on the oldest journey on earth. What she doesn’t guess is that there are unexpected allies and hidden secrets waiting for her attention. What she discovers is that finding her own best life means opening an unexpected and terrifying door.
Start a Conversation. Open a Door.
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if something feels off to you about the NORML ordinary world
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if you are wondering what parts of your own initiation you missed
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if you are a parent who has lost the map to your strange, difficult offspring
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if you are a reading center, after-school program, a parent, a counselor or therapist looking for conversation starters and activity materials
Find your own open Door.
Follow the hidden tracks and decode the Curious Card.
Follow the Upside Down sketch-and-journal prompts.
Add your own art to that thin door between Ramie's two worlds.
Fill in a Free Speech Bubble.
Open the Thin Door.
About THE THIN DOOR
The Thin Door is a contemporary retelling of our oldest story—
The rite of passage,
the epic journey of coming home to oneself,
the transformative power of initiation.
In this version of the story, Little Red Riding Hood enters The Matrix, where real is not always true.
There's NORML, which leaks like truth itself into everyone's head from the daily opinion.
Not Only Real, Mostly Lies. Our own Matrix, which owns us.
Ramie has her own strategies to make the NORML bearable, in a dull way. Is there another door?
There is the memory hole of that day when the world opened up for her to a luminous and glad moment where she felt purely loved and safely held.
It's a thin, Thin Door, and it opens to a world with a logic of its own.
HOW TO USE THIS BOOK: A Note from Auntie
The Thin Door is yours to use or to read in any way you choose. It can be a toy for playful explorations—a portal into a different version of the real—a sketchbook and journal for your own version of Ramie’s ride—or just a quick fun read.
ACTIVE READING: Follow the hidden track of one of our oldest archetypal tales to trace the patterns of your own true story. Click through the Thin Door into SummerTime to consider what choices you could make if that Door opened for you—and if you too might need to escape. Decode for yourself the koans on Sofi’s Curious Card.
ART JOURNALING: Find the Upside Downs, and sketch, write, and doodle the images and ideas they spin for you. Add your own art to the story breaks. Fill in the Free Speech Bubbles. Brain to hand to brain communication is a gloriously satisfying zone to drop into. Find your own open Door.
If you are reading the digital version, hello and welcome to your own experience of passing through THE THIN DOOR. There are some things that can only be done in the analog world of paper, and you may miss some of the graphic elements and interactive play with the book-as-toy. No worries, we link you over to the website for your own access to the standalone printable pdfs for play and exploration.
Till soon—
Auntie
SPOILERS IN 140 CHARACTERS or such
So exciting to be here on the #Show, blah blah,
even if everyone else is hoggin the mic,
and the spotlight just catches you for the laughs. Twitch.
Once I had a little bird. It was imaginary, but Sofi showed me how to stroke the soft feathers till we both feel safe again. I left Sofi behind a long time ago.
But does Sofi still show up when you need her?
Who is that wild-haired woman Willa, that space changer, desk-drummer, scat singer,
and why do the Shelter Rocks lead to her back kitchen door?
It's a warning, but you won't believe it: the Quest is never what it appears to be. That search for the perfect solacing X to patch your breaking heart never leads you to X anyway. Or if it does, you'll find out that X wasn't even what you n needed to find.
Crow cuts off the path with a black winging of air. Crow turns back
with a loud fierce caw caw caw to attention.
The allies are there when you least expect them.
THINK FREE they said.THINK FREE.
THE THIN DOOR will be available for pre-order early fall 2025.
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WeberMack.com is the home of THE THIN DOOR and other stories of coming home to oneself and one's own power.
SEE ALSO: Writing for the Young Adult, Night Kitchen Workshop Edition,
and Flash Fictions and Other Lies under the Downloads and Shares tab.
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