Under the Whispering Door
T.J. Klune, 2021
Fantasy RomanceContemporary fiction
A lawyer, a tea shop between life and death, and a ferryman who won't be impressed. A comedy about the paperwork of dying and who makes it bearable.
Feels like wonder and grief. About death, love and freedom.
A page from the book
What a man who spent his life looking down hopes to see next.
He hoped wherever he was going that there’d still be the sun and the moon and the stars. He’d spent a majority of his life with his head turned down. It seemed only fair that eternity would allow him to raise his face toward the sky. T.J. Klune.Klune, a Lambda Literary Award winner who writes queer characters by default, has seen his novels among the most frequently challenged books in US schools in the early 2020s.
Books that feel like this
More by T.J. Klune
The House in the Cerulean Sea
T.J. Klune, 2020
A by-the-book inspector of magical orphanages visits a house whose children—and caretaker—begin to undo his neatly filed life.
Where to get it
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Questions readers ask
- What is Under the Whispering Door like?
- Feels like wonder and grief. About death, love and freedom.
- What should I read after Under the Whispering Door?
- If you liked Under the Whispering Door, try The Magician’s Nephew (C.S. Lewis), Beach Read (Emily Henry) and Before the Coffee Gets Cold (Toshikazu Kawaguchi).
A taste of the feed
What a child asks for when there is nothing left to bargain with.
Up till then he had been looking at the Lion’s great feet and the huge claws on them; now, in his despair, he looked up at its face. What he saw surprised him as much as anything in his whole life. For the tawny face was bent down near his own and (wonder of wonders) great shining tears stood in the Lion’s eyes. They were such big, bright tears compared with Digory’s own that for a moment he felt as if the Lion must really be sorrier about his Mother than he was himself. ‘My son, my son,’ said Aslan. ‘I know. Grief is great.
The Magician’s Nephew · C.S. Lewis
What you lose the moment you finally open the last letter.
Either way, I’d fully intended to read the letter. I’d just been waiting for the right time, hoping the worst of my anger would settle and those last words from Dad would be comforting. Instead, a full year had passed and the dread I felt at the thought of opening the envelope grew every day. It was so unfair, that he should get the last word and I’d have no way to reply. To scream or cry or demand more answers. Once I’d opened it, there’d be no going back. That would be it. The final goodbye.
Beach Read · Emily Henry
Grief is easier to hide from strangers than from the people who love you.
Water flows from high places to low places. That is the nature of gravity. Emotions also seem to act according to gravity. When in the presence of someone with whom you have a bond, and to whom you have entrusted your feelings, it is hard to lie and get away with it. The truth just wants to come flowing out. This is especially the case when you are trying to hide your sadness or vulnerability. It is much easier to conceal sadness from a stranger, or from someone you don’t trust.
Before the Coffee Gets Cold · Toshikazu Kawaguchi
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