Book description
The Summer Book
TOVE JANSSON
WITH A FOREWORD BY ESTHER FREUD
An elderly artist and her six-year-old grand-daughter while away a
summer together on a tiny island in the gulf of Finland. As the two
learn to adjust to each other's fears, whims and yearnings, a fierce
yet understated love emerges - one that encompasses not only the
summer inhabitants but the very island itself. Written in a clear,
unsentimental style, full of brusque humour, and wisdom, The Summer
Book is a profoundly life-affirming story. Tove Jansson captured much
of her own life and spirit in the book, which was her favourite of her
adult novels. This new edition, with a Foreword by Esther Freud, sees
the return of a European literary gem - fresh, authentic and deeply humane.
New and beautifully presented edition of a Scandinavian literary
classic by Finland's most translated author should appeal to all ages
dissolving boundaries between fiction, biography and travel.
The writer and artist Tove Jansson (1914-2001) is best known as
the creator of the Moomin children's stories, which have been
published in 35 languages. The Summer Book was one of ten novels she
wrote for adults. It is regarded as a modern classic throughout Scandinavia.
Thomas Teal has translated Tove Jansson's The Summer Book, Fair
Play, for which he was awarded the Bernard Shaw Prize for translation
from the Swedish for the years 2007-2009; The True Deceiver, winner of
the Rochester Best Translated Book Award for 2011 and the forthcoming,
Art in Nature.
Ali Smith was born in Inverness in 1962 and lives in Cambridge,
England. She is the author of Free Love and Other Stories, Like, Hotel
World, Other Stories and Other Stories, and Girl Meets Boy. Her novel
The Accidental was named the 2005 Whitbread Novel of the Year and
shortlisted for the 2005 Man Booker Prize and the 2006 Orange Prize.
