In the novella “The Colonel’s Wife”, an elderly woman recounts her life story, from her childhood in Finnish Lapland between the two World Wars to her marriage to a colonel thirty years her senior, who collaborated with the Nazis during the Second World War.

“My Cat Yugoslavia” is a novel about Bekim, a young refugee in Finland, and his mother, who grew up in Kosovo. As an immigrant, a Muslim, and a gay man, Bekim struggles to find his place in Finnish society. One night, he meets a talking cat that moves in with him, further complicating his life.

Set in Helsinki in 1938, “The Wednesday Club” follows lawyer Claes Thune, whose wife Gabi has recently left him, and who runs his law office with dwindling enthusiasm. As a liberal, Thune grows increasingly disturbed by the anti-Semitic and Nazi-sympathising remarks of his friends and colleagues. This tension is also reflected in the Wednesday Club, a discussion group he founded with five friends, which gradually divides into a right-wing and a democratic faction. Matters become more complicated when Matilda, Thune’s new secretary, arrives. During a meeting of the Wednesday Club in Thune’s office, she overhears a familiar voice that triggers traumatic memories from her time in a prison camp during the Finnish Civil War of 1918. The identity of the voice is revealed only at the novel’s conclusion…

After the Second World War, a young Lutheran priest arrives with his wife and infant daughter on a remote island in the Åland archipelago off the southwest coast of Finland. As the seasons pass, the family’s bond with the island and its local community deepens.

“White Hunger” is a novella about the Finnish famine of 1866-1868, told through the harrowing journey of Marja, a peasant woman who flees her home with her children, trudging through the snow-bound Finnish countryside toward Saint Petersburg in search of survival. Her personal struggle is interwoven with scenes of politicians debating whether importing grain might plunge Finland (then a semi-autonomous Grand-Duchy within the Russian Empire) into debt and weaken its currency.

Salme, an elderly woman, agrees to sell her life story to a writer she meets at a book fair. However, conflicts arise when they disagree on the tone and accuracy of the book. The writer feels he needs to add fictional elements, but Salme is displeased with the changes to her story.

“Wonderful Women by the Sea” recounts a series of idyllic summer holidays in southern Finland in the 1960s, shared by two women – Isabella and Rosa – and their families, as seen through the eyes of Isabella’s seven-year-old son Thomas. The novel portrays how the women become increasingly inspired by the ideals of female liberation and sexual freedom from the American cultural revolution of the 1960s. Their longing to break free from their roles of wife and mother comes to a head when Isabella and Rosa take a short trip to Copenhagen – a journey after which nothing will ever be the same for young Thomas.

“A Day in Ostrobothnia” follows the Finnish Hakala family, as narrated by Erkki, the youngest of four sons. The Hakalas are a violent family, and when a machine gun is discovered, tensions spiral out of control. The novel combines family drama with broader reflections on the history and culture of Ostrobothnia, a farming region in western Finland.

“The Year of the Hare” is a comic novel about a journalist who changes his life after accidentally hitting a hare with his car. He leaves behind his wife and career and sets out on a journey through the wild forests of Finland, with the hare as a companion.

In this beloved Finnish novella, six-year-old Sophia and her grandmother spend the summer on a rocky island in the Gulf of Finland. They talk about life, death, and everything in between – but, out of love and concern for each other, they avoid the hardest subject of all: the death of Sophia’s mother. There is no intricate plot – the book unfolds through a series of vignettes that capture small incidents on the island, colouring the often prickly but always loving relationship between an adventurous child and her headstrong grandmother.