#2: T.J. Klune, Under the Whispering Door

[kareila]

Wallace Price is an asshole lawyer who is so caught up in his high powered job that he doesn't realize how empty and cold his life is until it's too late. One day he finds himself attending his own funeral, joined only by his ex-wife and his law partners, who have nothing good to say about him.

Luckily for Wallace, though, death is not the end...

This story has a lot of elements in common with Klune's The House in the Cerulean Sea. To name a few, avoiding obvious spoilers: found family; helping those who need it; healing from trauma; subverting upper management... However, while the characters in Cerulean were grappling with loneliness and ostracism, Whispering deals almost entirely in death and grief. It manages to be cozy and comforting while simultaneously confronting heavy and sometimes grim events. I struggled with the setup chapters because of how obnoxious Wallace was at the start, but once I hit the third act, I sped to the end in a fog of cathartic tears.

I would definitely recommend this to fans of Becky Chambers. There is even tea.