Parents' Guide to Pick the Lock

As PICK THE LOCK begins, 16-year-old Jane is living with Vernon (her father), her 12-year-old brother Henry, Marta the cook, Milorad the Serbian gardener, and Brutus, Milorad's shapeshifting pet rat, in what she describes as a "Pristine Victorian Prison." Jane and Henry have been locked up and home schooled by Vernon since the pandemic began four years ago. The only people from outside the house Jane ever sees are Finch, her mother's mean and untrustworthy sister, and Gemma who became Jane's ladies maid when she was only eight and Gemma was nine. Her mother (aka the punk rock superstar Mina Placenta) only makes occasional visits as she's constantly touring the world with her band. When Mina is home, she's confined by Vernon to a system of pneumatic tubes that travel around the house. Jane begins to write a punk opera in her head about freeing her mother. It's when she begins watching years of secretly recorded security videos that Vernon's lies about Mina are revealed and Jane finally has a window into what's really been going on between her parents. Desperate to return to school, Jane writes to the school district, hoping they'll send someone out to investigate Vernon's home school. Things go so badly for Vernon that Jane finds herself back in school for the first time since fifth grade. Welcomed by old friends, she begins to blossom and becomes even more defiant toward Vernon. One day, she decides to get into a tube and experience what it must be like for her mother. But instead of taking her to the dining room or her mother's bedroom, the tube deposits her at mysterious location and everything changes for Jane.