A review by elerireads
The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune

adventurous emotional funny lighthearted relaxing medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

I quite enjoyed this. It was a sweet story with some loveable quirky characters, but there was something in the tone which annoyed me - I'm going to say childishness but that's not quite it. I don't know what age group this is intended for but I think it's at least YA rather than kids. Mainly I felt like we were supposed to admire Linus way more than his actions deserved - he'd been part of a cruel and discriminatory system for decades, directly dealing with and deciding the fate of the children caught up in it, and it had never occurred to him that there was something wrong? he never once thought about what happened to the children after he made his decision? Sounds like either a complete moron or someone deliberately turning a blind eye, or both. Then he spends a month in a particular orphanage and suddenly his eyes are opened and he starts behaving vaguely decently, and oh isn't he so wonderful and of course Arthur falls in love with him and blah blah blah. So (a) it was unrealistic that he had such a dramatic change in a month, and (b) the change was still only to meet what I think would be the basic requirements of someone working with vulnerable children.

Aside from all that though, it was actually very readable and well paced, so I enjoyed it despite the things that annoyed me. I liked all the children's characters as well.