Maybe Death Isn’t The End After All
T.J. Klune’s Under the Whispering Door
It is ingrained in every human to oft think about their mortality. After our lifetime, we believe that God will judge us for our actions on Earth.
What if God is just a human construct? And the truth is something infinitely more complex?
This and more questions are likely to arise when reading ‘Under the Whispering Door.’ The book’s premise includes that of a queer love story from the unlikeliest of quarters.
For the most part, the story plays out at Charon’s Crossing, a quaint tea shop, where the dead come to pass through to a location that remains undisclosed, and only those who pass on can see.
The tale begins at the funeral of one Wallace Price, an uptight workaholic lawyer who’s never truly lived a day in his life. He has it all, a partner in a successful law firm, bucketloads of money and power.
So when he keels over from a heart attack and dies, he naturally can’t believe it. When his reaper Mei arrives while he is at his own funeral, albeit as a ghost, and teleports them to Charon’s Crossing, a tea shop owned by a ferryman named Hugo, who will help him cross over, does reality begin to sink in?
The tale begins at the funeral of one Wallace Price, an uptight workaholic lawyer who’s never truly lived a day in his life. He has it all, a partner in a successful law firm, bucketloads of money and power.
So when he keels over from a heart attack and dies, he naturally can’t believe it. When his reaper Mei arrives while he is at his own funeral, albeit as a ghost, and teleports them to Charon’s Crossing, a tea shop owned by a ferryman named Hugo, who will help him cross over, does reality begin to sink in?
But at first, there is denial, indignation, and finally, acceptance as it seems that even in death, he does not wish to abandon the world of the living.
On his arrival, he is offered a cup of tea which Wallace promptly refuses. After all, he is dead, and what good is a cup of tea to help assuage that fact?
“The first time you share tea, you are a stranger. The second time you share tea, you are an honoured guest. The third time you share tea, you become family.”
Teaching him the ropes of “how to be a proper ghost” is the ferryman Hugo’s grandfather Nelson, who is a ghost himself and has chosen not to move on as he wishes to keep an eye on his grandson. Then there’s the ghost dog Apollo who is ever faithful to Hugo and doesn’t wish to move on either, and there is no convincing him otherwise.
Wallace Price gradually morphs from an abrasive individual into a caring, empathetic human. All it took for him to transform into one was to die!
The book has its share of poignant moments where a reaper, in haste, forces a young girl to forcibly move on against her will and is blinked out of existence by the Manager, Hugo’s boss. The Manager is a god-like entity who is referenced as a cosmic being as old as the universe itself and shape shifts into a boy from whatever he is when he visits them.
To shed some light on that, when the manager appears and departs, the vicinity in its entirety is illuminated, and time as we know it comes to a standstill.
At one point, he describes himself as being of the sun and the stars. The true extent of his power is never known. This ambiguity, in a way, helps the story, though as a matter of preference, it would have been nice to have a bit of clarity on who or what the Manager is.
The narrative of the book is crisp and moves along at a reasonable pace. However, it meanders, and the pacing slows as it winds down. It would have been welcome if the book had been a tad shorter than its 373 pages.
The real winner in the book is the sheer variety of teas on offer at the quaint little teashop. So vividly described, with flavours from peppermint to orange, I could almost taste them, and surely any other reader would too!
