I didn’t mind this book at all. I know everyone loves TJ Klune, and I want to love him as much as everyone else, but as this was the fourth book of his that I have read and have only felt so-so about, I think it’s time for me to realize his books aren’t for me.

I want to note that there is nothing wrong with this book. I think the problem here is me and not the book itself.

After enjoying The House in the Cerulean Sea last year, I was interested in checking out Under the Whispering Door, especially after seeing some good reviews and recommendations. I am so glad I did, as I liked it even more than Cerulean Sea.

The story starts off with Wallace presenting as a total jerk and then dying shortly after. Then you see his sparsely attended funeral that includes a mystery guest. This mystery guest turns out to be a Reaper, who takes him to Charon's Crossing, which is a tea and pastry shop with a quirky design. From there, the story becomes more and more amazing, especially once Hugo is brought onto the scene.

This novel has so many layers and reads as a fantasy of sorts. It reminds me of a cross between Beetlejuice, Ghost, and Defending Your Life. I loved all the characters (except for the ones I shouldn't like, of course). There was a lot of symbolism and beauty, even though the story was all about death. The LGBTQ representation made me think of Schitt's Creek, in that it was just something accepted throughout. I enjoyed seeing everything through Wallace's eyes, including the changes he makes for himself along the way. The descriptions were great and really brought everything in the story to life. There were a lot of humorous moments, alongside the heartwarming ones.

Overall, I just really enjoyed this novel and highly recommend it. I'm excited for some others in my house to read it soon.

Movie casting suggestions:
Wallace: Brian Nolan
Hugo: Jeffrey Bowyer-Chapman
Mei: Awkwafina
Nelson: Morgan Freeman
Nancy: Rachelle Lefevre
Desdemona: Emma Stone
Cameron: Scott Evans
Alan: Hart Denton

Under The Whispering Door asks the question of what it really means to live amidst the inevitability of death and how it's never too late to change-- as a person along with the course/outcome of your life.

Although it was a bit more formulaic and a little more in your face with its life lessons than The House In The Cerulean Sea, I know I can rely on wholesome, heartwarming content whenever I read a T.J. Klune book. If you enjoy the found family trope with quirky, whimsical characters, satisfying redemption arcs or are just in need of a warm, comforting hug of a book, I definitely recommend Klune's work as he does this all so seamlessly. He creates the kind of books that you didn't know you needed until you find yourself deep in the story and you get sucked in.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publishers for providing me an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

The House in the Cerulean Sea was one of my favorite books last year, while the Extraordinaries was one of my least favorites, so I was beyond thankful when I totally fell in love with this book. TJ Klune thrives when he writes adult novels and this love story was a gem from start to finish. I definitely cried a few times, but it was still such a heartwarming tale. At this point I will read anything Klune writes.

This story was lovely! TJ is incredible and brilliant. Wallace is a not so good person and lawyer who has a heart attack. In the process of crossing over he is allowed to learn how to become a better person. I was in tears by the end of this, I felt connected with the characters in a way I haven’t in a long time.

So I wanted to read this book because I was one of very few people I know who didn't love House in the Cerulean Sea, but I felt like this author had such good things to say, and so I was hoping this book would have a journey that I enjoyed more the second time around. For a good chunk of the book, this was the case for me.
I liked the story line as well as the idea of death, regret, and acceptance. There were some really funny moments and I felt hooked right away. Throughout I was much more into it than the previous book and for a while didn't want to put in down, it started to slow for me again. Unfortunately, there were a few things along the way that didn't work for me. The first was that Hugo and Wallace's relationship didn't quite develop but sort of was just suddenly there without as much of a build. I didn't feel like they (or we as readers) got a chance to hope for it long enough. The Desdemona stuff felt a bit unnecessary to me and entered midway through a journey I was enjoying. I did get back into it after that, but then the end was also anti-climactic for me when suddenly the manager comes and offers a solution so I didn't see a real conflict being overcome. Almost everyone I have spoken to loved this book though so it might just not be my style. I do look forward to reading more of this author's work though because it did engage me more this time around, I feel like it didn't quite land for me in the end. Thanks for much for the opportunity to read it!

This is one of my new favorite books of all time. It took me a little bit of time to get into it, but once I warmed up to where the story was going, I had so much fun getting to know all the characters and was really invested in their journeys. The story was original, well-written, moving, and thoughtful. There were also moments where I found myself laughing out loud. This book is a perfect balance of all the best things. I’ve recommended this book countless times since finishing it.

This was just such a delightful, charming novel. T.J. Klune writes the kind of stories that feel like a warm embrace and that fill me up with hope for humanity.

Under The Whispering Door follows Wallace, a horrible – and, frankly, annoying – man who cares for no one and nothing besides his job, that dies suddenly and ends up at Chiron’s Crossing, a teashop owned by a guy named Hugo who is also the Ferryman that helps souls cross. And from then it’s all a story about character development, found family and hope – with a romance subplot and themes of mental health sprinkled in.

Again, this was an absolute delight to read (even when Wallace was being a little shit) and gave me the same feeling as The House in the Cerulean Sea, even though they had such different themes. I loved the found family aspect the most. I could really feel the affection and understanding these people had built for each other and Wallace fit right in there.

Some elements could’ve been more developed, yes, but, overall, it was just a lovely reading experience.

As always T J Kline has created something beyond magical that touches every fibre of your being and gives you every emotion you can imagine at the same time a massive 5star must read!!

One of the best ways to read this book is to go in without expecting a happy ending. While that may sound brutally honest, the author does his best to consistently provide bittersweet feelings of hope and happiness within the words of each page. By the end, you’ve experienced whispers of the stages of grief and know that life can be found in death. As someone who has lost and grieved and hurt over lost loved ones, reading this felt like coming home to a warm hug after a hard journey. Possibly a warm cup of tea included.

5⭐️

There are certain books out there that feel as if they were written for you and this is one of those. I adore Klune books because he expertly navigates whimsy but also depth. This book had it all. I was laughing and swooning one moment then full blown sobbing the next. I know this is a story that will forever stick with ne

Another awesome book by TJ Klune. I felt this was a great addition to their other works and I cannot wait to see more from them. Definitely will be recommending to my coworkers and friends.

I really wanted to like this but I ... strongly disliked it right from the beginning all the way to the end and I just about have nothing nice to say about it? I'm ... I don't know, I'm sorry I really tried and I was really excited to read it, hoping for a 5 star read based on all the reviews but god damn, everything about this infuriated me.

The main character starts off as a cartoonish villain akin to that of Ebenezer Scrooge, except Scrooge is actually an interesting character and Wallace is most definitely not! He's simply an asshole in a way that can only exist in children's books because human beings do not act like that. And what's worse: he's an asshole for no reason, there's no backstory to explain, nothing to justify, not one single redeeming quality in his entire life and background and then, very quickly within the first 10-15 pages of the book, he dies and he suddenly stops being an asshole, again for no reason, and is now just mainly a stupid fool.

He is then taken by his seemingly incompetent (yet cool and quirky!) reaper to a tea house to prepare for "crossing over" (idk man) and he has to come to accept that he's dead. Except that this acceptance is super muddled because it seems like he has accepted? He is aware that he's dead, he was at his own funeral? Yet ... the logic here and this whole segment's character needs & wants are just up in the air for me (and for the writer, many many times it's mentioned that Wallace doesn't know what he wants and what he's hoping to get and like ... then what's the point?!). He remains a stupid fool for a while until a few chapters down the line where he, AGAIN for no reason suddenly turns into a cartoonish hero that inspires all and fixes everything and has all the magical answers to all of life's deepest questions and is now worthy of the brooding handsome ferryman who owns the teashop.

There is not even a shred of character development here, there's no redemption arc because there's no depth to this character (or any of the other caricatures that litter the book) and there's no excitement or joy or even sadness whenever things happen just because everything feels like a children's 2D drawing and all the events just fall so damn flat. The roman comes absolutely out of nowhere, does not develop, and does not serve any kind of a purpose rather than to try and humanize Wallace but like ... it doesn't work if it's sudden!!!

There are pages and pages filled with ridiculous things like Wallace's attempts at changing out of whatever he's wearing (which he died in) or him messing with a fake medium or descriptions of tea and its importance and it's all just so pointless, jumping from one branch to another without any sense of coherence. There are so many potentially touching issues brushed upon here, in a book about death and grief and the various types of loss, there wasn't a single moment where I felt like the book was moving me or able to make its point and I'm super disappointed in that to be honest. I'm not even going to mention the ending because I had just completely lost faith in the book and was just reading to get it over with but man ... all signs point to a book that doesn't really know what its message is, to be honest.

The House in the Cerulean Sea blew me away. So charming and cosy. So naturally I had high expectations for Under the Whispering Door, and it did not disappoint! Yet, it also wasn’t quite what I was expecting.

This was a slow burner story, and it took some time to become invested. Some moments with more telling than showing, but mostly a flowing, easy to read story.

Klune excels with his characters. They are quirky and endearing. They immediately wormed their way into my heart. I love the found family trope, and it excels here.

Overall, another quality installment from Klune.

Like everyone else, I adored TJ Klune's previous adult fantasy The House in the Cerulean Sea. To be clear, Under the Whispering Door is not a sequel to that book (despite the similar cover art style) and I knew this going in, but I still had high hopes for it. Ultimately, I found this novel very readable and the characters endearing, but at the end I found myself asking that dreaded (to me) question: what was the point? I can't say that this book does much either in contribution to the genre or really that it made me think on any interesting ideas. The plot felt overly simple, to the point that it wasn't satisfying in the end. Though I was honestly disappointed here, I will still be looking out for Klune's next adult fantasy/fiction book because I do think he's capable of much better.

I think I would have had a different opinion of this book if a) I had read other Klune books first or b) my grandfather had not recently passed. This was an excellent depiction of grief but was not as strong as "The House in the Cerulean Sea"

this is not a bad book by any means, but it was not the book for me.

so, i'm going to try and keep this review short.

i found under the whispering door to be plentiful in platitudes (as trite as, literally, “it was better to have had it... than to never have had it at all”) and lacking in emotional poignancy for me personally. my hopes were uplifted toward the middle of the book when i started developing genuine affection for and connections to wallace, hugo, nelson, mei, and apollo, but my enjoyment was utterly robbed by (view spoiler): it felt like all that the book was (hopefully) building up to - with its navigation of the complexities of grief and moving on and letting go - was suddenly relinquished in favour of something more along the lines of wish fulfillment and ultimately far less satisfying.

again, for me personally.

last thing i want to mention: i know that this book underwent review by sensitivity readers, and yet i still am dissatisfied with its depiction of the three key BIPOC characters: hugo, nelson, and mei. the reason is simple - they seemed to exist primarily to help wallace, a cis white man, develop and grow. in other words, hugo, nelson, and mei were flattened into magical BIPOC, both in a literal sense (they are ferryman, ghost, and reaper, respectively) but i am also specifically invoking the tired, problematic trope in which BIPOC happily provide tireless emotional labour for the sake of bettering white characters. i don't think this was the book's intention, but this was nonetheless its impression and impact on me.

bottom line, though: i could totally see this becoming a blockbuster film that gets folks WEEPING in theatres. tj klune's writing would translate *seamlessly* into a dramedy, and someone should make that happen stat!


many thanks to netgalley & macmillan-tor/forge for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

TJ Klune does not disappoint.

Under the Whispering Door handles life's most difficult questions with compassion and tenderness. In Klune's typical style, all of the characters are loving, willing to change, and also perfectly funny.

I really enjoyed Mei and Nelson the most, as secondary characters they really shine.

This book did make me cry, but luckily not as much as I was expecting. It was the stories of the other people passing through the tea shop that made me start sobbing.

The themes of Under the Whispering Door have been explored by authors a million times over, but TJ Klune found a unique way to discuss them. I am so glad that there was a happy, if bittersweet ending.

Wow! All I can say is wow! I’m speechless by how brilliant this book was. TJ Klune has created a literary masterpiece and I cannot recommend it enough

An incredible follow up to House on the Cerulean Sea. I had such high hopes going into this book, and this book upheld them all. TJ Klune has written another addictive story.