Somewhere around twenty-five thousand years ago, or perhaps about thirty years ago, on a nameless island paradise, a nameless woman had a child with a man who called himself Victory. Victory had the power to reshape the world, so the island became a peninsula that had always been there. Eventually the man became a religious leader called the Perfect and Kind. The woman became a possibly insane person called Mother-of-Glory who remembers a past that no longer exists. She named their son Fetter, because he was to be the chains that limited his father.

Don’t worry. It doesn’t have to make sense. Understanding is not important here.

The Saint of Bright Doors is Fetter’s story. Fetter has no shadow, since his mother cut it from him at birth. He can see the “invisible powers” which his mother calls “demons.” And he floats, so he must pay attention in order to keep himself literally grounded. His mother trained him in assassination, with the goal of eventually killing his father.

He has come to an ancient city called Luriat, which (according to his mother) came into existence shortly after Fetter’s birth. It is a complicated place, full of competing religions and governments. The people who think they know what’s going on, can do so only because they ignore things that don’t make sense. There are pograms and plagues and mysterious disappearances which go unquestioned and unchecked. There are visionaries and saints and the Unchosen, who trained to be visionaries and saints but didn’t quite make the grade. And throughout the city there are brightly painted doors which don’t open and seem to lead to nowhere.

This is a brilliantly written book, meant perhaps to teach the reader what it is like to live in a place of contradictions and displacement. Its dreamy unreality evokes a world where no one is entirely sure what they’re allowed to do, yet following the rules is of utmost importance. The book is more an experience than a story, yet the plot is deftly built, a solid narrative assembled, one brick at at time, from nonsense. It is well worth experiencing.