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The Turku Decameron
Photo: Ari Kasanen It was in the 1960s that Finns began to move en masse from the countryside to the town, but literature has not urbanised itself at quite the same pace. The majority of new literature...
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Juha Seppälä: Paholaisen haarukka [The Devil’s fork]
Paholaisen haarukka [The Devil’s fork] Helsinki: WSOY, 2008. 267 p. ISBN 978-951-0-34534-4 € 32, hardback Seldom does a novel manage to be as topical as Juha Seppälä’s latest – his tenth – which...
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Kjell Westö: Gå inte ensam ut i natten [Don't go out into the night alone]
Gå inte ensam ut i natten [Don’t go out into the night alone] Helsinki: Söderströms, 2009. 604 p. ISBN 978-951-52-2609-9 25 €, hardback Finnish translation (by Katriina Savolainen): Älä käy yöhön yksin...
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Jari Tervo: Koljatti [Goliath]
Koljatti [Goliath] Helsinki: WSOY, 2009. 317 p. ISBN 978-951-0-35610-4 25 €, hardback Jari Tervo (born 1959) writes comic, swiftly paced, linguistically accomplished prose with touches of historicism,...
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Teemu Kaskinen: Sinulle, yö [To you, the night]
Sinulle, yö [To you, the night] Helsinki: WSOY, 2009. 268 p. ISBN 978-951-0-35599-2 € 29, hardback In Teemu Kaskinen’s debut novel, Finland is at war with Norway and its NATO ally the United States....
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Tuomas Kyrö: 700 grammaa [700 grams]
700 grammaa [700 grams] Helsinki: WSOY, 2009. 379 p. ISBN 978-951-0-35601-2 € 30, hardback The genre of the picaresque novel is doing well, and one of its foremost exponents in Finland is Tuomas Kyrö...
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Antti Hyry: Uuni [The stove]
Uuni [The stove] Helsinki: Otava, 2009. 400 p. ISBN 978-951-1-23845-4 28 €, hardback Many authors have inspired imitators, at least for a brief period, but few prove to be so original that they lend...
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Juha Seppälä: Takla Makan
Takla Makan Helsinki: WSOY, 2010. 149 p. ISBN 978-951-0-36322-5 € 27, hardback Author Juha Seppälä’s manner of portraying the world is often characterised as harsh and desolate, and this certainly...
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Jari Tervo: Layla
Layla Helsinki: WSOY, 2011. 361 p. ISBN 978-951-0-38277-6 31 €, hardback Social reality has stepped firmly into contemporary Finnish literature. Many of the new novels deal with economic inequality,...
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Special effects
Veikko Huovinen. Photo: Harri Nurminen Depictions of simple country folk who live close to nature, diabolical satire of the powers that be, playful rambling tales. The humour of Veikko Huovinen has two...
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Jouni K. Kemppainen: Onnellinen mies. Arto Paasilinnan elämä [A happy man....
Onnellinen mies. Arto Paasilinnan elämä [A happy man. The life of Arto Paasilinna] Espoo: Paasilinna, 2012. 307 p. ISBN 978-952-5856-37-8 € 28, hardback Arto Paasilinna (born 1942) is an uncanny...
View ArticleBetween good and evil
There are some wounds which take far longer than three generations to heal. In 1918 the great grandfathers of today’s Finns fought a bloody war, and touching the scars that conflict left behind still...
View ArticleRight between the eyes
Something that most Finnish men have in common is the one year’s service in the army they experience at the age of around twenty. Military service affects all males, but nowadays many opt to discharge...
View ArticleHidden under the words
The short story ‘Kimalaisen hunajaa’ (‘The honey of the bee’) offers an excellent glimpse into the work of Juha Seppälä. The chain of generations is strongly present in it, as well as the changing...
View ArticleA day in the life of a son
Jarmo Papinniemi on Markku Pääskynen’s new novel In Markku Pääskynen‘s third novel, the two greatest modernists’ ways of portraying the human mind come together: James Joyce’s plunging, leaping,...
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