Du thé pour les fantômes by Chris Vuklisevic draws us into a world where the boundary between the living and the dead feels fragile, almost permeable — and where two sisters, long divided by the past, are forced to face it together.

Agonie is a witch, while her sister Félicité hunts ghosts and helps them pass “beyond.” The two have not spoken in thirty years — until their mother dies in a horrifying way, possessed by fifty-six different personalities. Her final words, however, carry a mystery that can only be unraveled in one way: by finding her ghost.

What follows is a strange and quietly beautiful journey — an exploration of memory, trauma, and family secrets, where the sisters must not only find their mother, but rediscover each other. Along the way, they move through a world filled with curious, almost untranslatable concepts — strange-tea, teararium, time-daze, beyond-name — a language that feels like magic in itself. And yet beneath this imaginative surface lies something deeply human: a story about grief that does not disappear, about cracks we try to mend with gold, and about love that endures even after death.

In an interview, Vuklisevic shares:
“I wanted to write a ghost story that doesn’t frighten, but heals. To me, ghosts are memories that refuse to disappear.”

He adds:
“Language was essential — creating new words allowed me to express things that ordinary language cannot contain.”

For the author, the novel is ultimately an exploration of how we live with loss:
“Grief is like a house with many rooms. Sometimes we get lost in it. Sometimes we find a door that leads us back to life.”