Pick the Lock
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  • Published: 20 January 2026
  • ISBN: 9780593353981
  • Imprint: Dutton
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 400
  • RRP: $26.99

Pick the Lock

Formats & editions
Paperback
20 Jan 2026
Hardback
14 Jan 2025
EBook
24 Sep 2024
Audiobook
24 Sep 2024
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From two-time Michael L. Printz Award winner A.S. King, a weird and insightful new novel about a girl intent on picking the lock of her toxic family.

From Michael L. Printz Award winner A.S. King, a weird and insightful new novel about a girl intent on picking the lock of her toxic family.

Jane Vandermaker-Cook would like her mother back. As Jane's mother tours the world to support the family, Jane lives and goes to school in a Victorian mansion with her younger brother and their mendacious father who confines Jane’s mother to a system of pneumatic tubes whenever she’s at home. And then there's weirdly ever-present Aunt Finch, Milorad the gardener, and his rat, Brutus. For Jane, this all seems normal until she suddenly gains access to the files for a lifetime of security-camera videos—her lifetime.

A.S. King's latest surrealist masterpiece follows Jane’s bizarre and brilliant journey to reconnect with her mother by breaking out of her shell and composing a punk opera.
  • Published: 20 January 2026
  • ISBN: 9780593353981
  • Imprint: Dutton
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 400
  • RRP: $26.99
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Also by A.S. King

Reality Boy
I Crawl Through It
The Collectors: Stories
The Dust of 100 Dogs
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Praise for Pick the Lock

* "Printz Award–winning King has written another remarkable, character-driven book that dazzles with its originality. With that and its employment of magic realism, it is sui generis, and at 400-plus pages, it is one of King’s most ambitious, and most successful, books. And that, God knows, is no lie."—Booklist, starred review

* "A worthy literary heir to feminist novels like The Stepford Wives, updated and recast for a new generation, this is a much-needed, thought-provoking tale of survival and triumph.”—BCCB, starred review

"Helmed by Jane’s penetrating commentary, this unconventional narrative melds punk anthems and bewildering interludes from a shape-shifting rat with King’s quirky blend of present-day issues and mind-bending twists to unlock complex, thought-provoking insight."—Publishers Weekly