sarahmatthews 's review for:

The Summer Book by Tove Jansson

slow-paced

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The Summer Book by Tove Jansson

Tr. Thomas Teal

Read in Braille

Sort Of Books

Pub. 1972, 172pp

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Oh what a wonderful book! I’ve been meaning to read this for a while and selected it to take on holiday as a contrast to a  fast paced, plot driven novel I’d started.

This is the story of six-year-old Sophia and her summer on a small island off the coast of Finland. She spends most of her time with her Grandmother who’s wise, playful, sarcastic, sometimes cranky but incredibly kind at heart. Their conversations are amusing, and so well observed. They get up to low stakes adventures, told in chapters that are kind of short stories and I found it so calming to read that I made it last as long as I could, only reading a few pages at a time. It’s been so wonderful to retreat into their world for a few minutes before starting my day. 

Here’s a passage for an example of the writing: 

“Grandma sat in the magic forest and carved outlandish animals. She cut them from branches and driftwood and gave them paws and faces, but she only hinted at what they looked like and never made them too distinct.They retained their wooden souls, and the curve of their backs and legs had the enigmatic shape of growth itself and remained a part of the decaying forest. Sometimes she cut them directly out of a stump or the trunk of a tree.Her carvings became more and more numerous.They clung to trees or sat astride the branches, they rested against the trunks or settled into the ground. With outstretched arms, they sank in the marsh or they curled up quietly and slept by a root.Sometimes they were only a profile in the shadows, and sometimes there were two or three together, entwined in battle or in love. Grandmother worked only in old wood that had already found its form. That is, she saw and selected those pieces of wood that expressed what she wanted them to say.”

And I adore this description: 

“She gazed out over the lee shore to the waves that swept around the island on both sides and then rejoined and moved on towards the mainland–a long blue landscape of vanishing waves that left only a small wedge of quiet water behind them. A fishing boat with a big white moustache was sailing across the bay.”

This is a special book about connection between the generations and an appreciation of the unpredictability of nature -  a read to savour. 

My edition included a great forward by Esther Freud which shed light on the deeply personal nature of the book. I read this novel for Women in Translation Month #WITMonth