Hey, what's up, you guys? It's Connor, and
today we're gonna be doing an individual
book review for The House in the
Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune. If you guys
don't know, this is a fantasy book that
follows a character named Linus Baker.
At the beginning of the book, you find out
that he is a caseworker for the
Department in Charge of Magical Youths
and has for quite a long time. He's about
40 years old, and I think he's worked for
this company for about 19 of those 40
years. I think he's a bit in a rut. He is
a very by-the-book person. He follows all
of the rules for this department to a
tee and doesn't really think about them
all that much. He lives a pretty boring
life other than the fact that he has a
cat with a huge personality. And the only
personalized item he has in his office
is a mousepad and it says, "Don't You Wish You Were Here? and it's a picture of an
ocean. That's it. This department is in
charge of all of the magical youths, and
the caseworkers go to these different
orphanages that are dedicated to magical
youths to make sure that they're up to
code and that they're up to the
standards that this department has
decided on. Linus has suggested that some
orphanages closed down and some don't. And he doesn't really think about what
happens to the children afterward. This
department, at the beginning of the book,
needs someone that's by-the-book to go
on a classified case to this orphanage
that has a lot of dangerous magical
youths at it. They pick Linus because he
doesn't give them any reason to suspect
that he won't give an honest opinion.
And so at the beginning of the book he goes
to this orphanage, and he finds out that
it's a house in the cerulean sea. Then he
just has to decide the fate of this
orphanage and of these children basically. As usual with my book reviews,
I'm gonna go through my pros, go through
my cons, and give you my rating, and be done.
Buckle up, cuz I have a lot of pros. [laughs]
My first pro for this book was that I
really loved the characters. This book
for me was all about the characters. I
loved Linus. He is such a boring person
at the beginning of the book. He's in
such a big rut, and he reminds me of the
characters from Office Space if you guys
have seen that movie. The characters just
live a very boring, grey life. They go to
their cubicles, and they work on their
papers or whatever it is. And then they
go home, and then they come back and do
the same thing over and over and over
again. That is Linus Baker.  He goes to
work, comes home, hangs
with this cat, listens to music; goes
back to work. I loved seeing him interact
with the people at this orphanage I
loved seeing him interact with Arthur
Parnassus, who is the caretaker of this
orphanage. He is the one that's in charge
of all of these different magical youths
that are deemed way more dangerous than
all of the other magical youths that
Linus has seen in the past. At this
orphanage -- it's not a spoiler because
it's in the blurb but -- there are six
children that are here, and they are all
different species. There's a female gnome
named Talia who I loved. She is super
into gardening, obviously because garden
gnomes, but I really loved how loyal she
is. Just how she will do anything for the
other children or Arthur at this
orphanage, I just love how protective she
is. I think she's the first child that
Linus meets when he gets there. There's
also Phee who's a forest sprite, so she
has all of her magical powers. There is
Theodore who is a wyvern. He doesn't
speak English. I definitely feel like
Theodore represents people that speak
other languages or that people refuse to
learn that language. Like, people that
have sign language and how people don't
make accommodations for them. And so
historically they've just been written
off as not-as-intelligent as people that
can speak English verbally [text: orally], so I really
liked Theodore. He's so sweet. I love that
he loves his treasure and everything
like that.
There's Chauncey who's the unidentified,
green blob character cuz who knows what
he is? But he just wanted to be a bellhop,
and I loved him. There's Sal who is a
were-pomeranian, so he turns into a
pomeranian. And he is a lot more reserved
than all of the other children because
of things that have happened that you
find out in the book. Really love Sal. Him
and Theodore hang out a lot, and then the
last character who's probably the
biggest personality of all of them is
Lucy, who is the Antichrist.
I think he's six, and I just love him so
much. I love how he talks.
I love how uncomfortable he makes
characters on purpose, and so I just was
having a blast with all of these
different characters and seeing how they
all interact with all of the other ones
and how much love they have for each
other. It's like a very found family
heavy story, and I'm here for that. And so
my biggest pro for this book is
definitely the characters. I loved all of
them. If you just want to read a
super sweet story about some very nice,
loveable characters,
this one's great. My next pro is that I
really loved this premise. It had so many
different vibes of things that I felt
were familiar to me. Like I said, the
character of Linus, and this department,
and how it's set up really reminded me
of Office Space and how boring that is.
And then it also kind of reminded me of
1984 because this department, this
government agency, has so much power over
these children and is oppressive. They
completely control these children's
lives because they were ripped away from
their parents which has happened
historically with minorities and white
people, and so you do see that reflected
in these children. These children would
have completely different lives if they
were allowed to stay with family members
or stay with people of their own kind,
but because they're all put together,
they make their own little culture with
each other. And I was really enjoying
that despite everything, that these
characters have found each other and
love each other. With all of these
different children, and all of these
different powers, and everything like
that, it definitely reminded me a bit of,
like, a Miss Peregrine's Home for
Peculiar Children vibe. Not that those
two have anything to do with each other,
but just that there is a concentration
of magical children together. I love it,
and this story taken as a whole a little
bit reminded me of the premise of Heroes
if you guys have seen that TV show.
Basically, there's a government agency
that is trying to track down all of
these people that have supernatural
powers and control them, and that's
basically what the department does.
My next pro for this book is that I really
liked all the messages that it has. It is
definitely heavy on the themes of family
and of home: what makes up a home; what
makes up a family. Through Linus, you
explore things like living versus just
existing, and through these orphans and
through these orphanages in general, you
start to explore things like safe places
versus isolating people and the effects
that social isolation can have instead
of just making a safe place for someone
where they can be themselves and also
interact and break down some of the
stereotypes that surround people. Really
loved all the messages. A+! My next
pro for this book was that I really
enjoyed the writing. I actually listened
to this as an audiobook, and I borrowed
it from my library, and then picked up a
physical copy because I want to reread
it soon so I can't see how the writing
reads. But listening to it was very
pleasant. I think that whoever did the
narration for the audiobook did
the dialogue really well. I really
enjoyed hearing all of the children talk
to each other and just the way that they
speak. I just really enjoyed the audiobook, and I'm really excited to reread
this and physically read it to see if I
still really enjoy the writing. And my
last pro for this book is that I just
really love the happy feeling of this
book. It is incredibly sweet, and I think
that during this time of social
distancing, and quarantine, and just being
by yourself can get you pretty down. This
book will make you feel pretty happy
because I just feel like all the
characters are great, and they all love
each other and, it's just a really good
feel-good book. This isn't a book that's
high adventure. This isn't swashbuckling.
This isn't got some primordial evil or
anything like that.
It's a lot more quiet, but I really
enjoyed it for that. And I loved it.
As for cons, I honestly couldn't think of
any. I think that my only con is that
this is a standalone, and I really wished
there was more story to it. Like, I really
want to find out what happens to the
characters after the ending of this book.
Not that the ending isn't satisfying,
it's just I loved them, so I want to keep
reading about them. So much so that I
actually built this house in The Sims 4
and made the characters so that I could
continue their lives and make them get
all the lives that they deserve. So
that's how much I enjoyed this book.
I built it in the Sims, like, completely
accurate. Like, all the rooms and
everything like that. I went back and
listened to the sections that described
the house, and where people's rooms were
and, what the rooms look like, and built
it in the Sims. So you know I was totally
invested in this book to have spent that
much time to go back and do that. In the
end, I had a ton of pros for this book.
Really, really enjoyed it. I had no idea
what this book was gonna be about when I
borrowed it from the library. I just saw
that it had a pretty vibrant cover and
the premise sounds interesting enough. I
am so shocked and pleasantly surprised
by how much I enjoyed this. I gave this
book 5 stars. I highly recommend it, and I
hope you guys will check it out.
Oh, also there's a gay romance that
happens. I totally forgot to address that,
but yeah that's in there too. I also
thought that that was really well done.
That was another pro. I thought that the
romance between Linus and
Arthur was slow, and made sense, and was
well done, and I enjoyed watching it
unfold because it wasn't like a we meet
and we're in love kind of thing. It was a
we meet let's see how you are and what
things are like and then go from there.
So I enjoyed it for that. And I also
forgot to mention that there's another
character named Zoe who is a Island
sprite who lives on the island, and I
really enjoyed her as well. As I said, I
give this book five stars
and definitely recommend it. Please go
check it out if you would like to. None
of that was a spoiler because it's all
in the blurb, so check it out. So that's
my review on The House in the Cerulean Sea
by TJ Klune. If you liked it, please
give it a big thumbs up and comment down
below if you've read this book.  Did you
enjoy it as much as I did because I
thought it was so sweet and I loved it.
If you're interested in reading it now,
let me know that as well.
Anything else you want me to know, leave
it down below, and I will talk to you
guys next time. Bye.
Nook, you wanna say bye? Say bye. Nookie, say bye. Good boy. [laughs]
 
