Esa Kauppila Wins Portti Competition

The results of the 23rd annual Portti short story competition were announced yesterday in Tampere. The winner is Esa Kauppila for Lasin läpi rantaan päin (“Through the glass, towards the shore”).

The second place was a tie between Anne Leinonen and Anni Nupponen, and Kirsti Ellilä came third (although I think that should have been fourth, since the second place was tied). Honorable mentions were awarded to Joonas Kallonen, Petri Laine & Anne Leinonen, Mika-Petri Lauronen, Timo Männikkö, Erkka Mykkänen, Olli Rintamäki, Petri Salin, M.G. Soikkeli, and Susi Vaasjoki.

(Info from the “scifi” list)

Update: Anne has more details and a photo. Anne mentions that the winning stories usually are much longer than the average texts in the competition (which is one of the reasons I’m not especially interested in the Portti competition—I have a hard time classifying for example last year’s winner, almost 13 000 words, as a short story any more), and that the theme this year was reaching to the pagan roots of the Finnish people and that there was little science fiction in the awarded stories (leaning towards fantasy and horror).

Year’s Last

A pretty good turnout at the mafia tonight. In the early evening there was a Serious Literary Discussion of many good books. Later on, as more people appeared, the topics became more varied, such as fandom, stupid Internet videos, cameras, tv shows, and the difficulty of Christmas shopping. A fun evening, as usual—see you all again next year!

Last First Thursday

The last Turku pub meeting for this year is today. That means I’ll be in Bar Bremer at six. Hope to see you there too!

Tähtivaeltaja Short Story Competition

The Helsinki Science Fiction Society has announced the second Tähtivaeltaja short story competition. The theme is “sf in space”. The winner will receive a cash prize of 350 euros and there are book and other prizes for the runners up to be awarded by the jury.

The preliminary jury (researcher Irma Hirsjärvi and author Anne Leinonen) will select the finalists, and the winner will be decided by a jury comprising editor Toni Jerrman, editor Jukka Halme, and author Tiina Raevaara.

More info (in Finnish) on Babek nabel.

Management by Sauron

On Friday, there was a dissertation at the University of Tampere, Faculty of Economics and Administration, Dept. of Management Studies titled, “Valta, johtajuus, tuho ja toivo J.R.R. Tolkienin teoksessa Taru sormusten herrasta” (“Power, leadership, destruction and hope in J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings”). Harri Hietikko has studied the phenomena of power and leadership in Tolkien’s novel, the power structures in the societies of Middle Earth, and the struggle to own the ring of power. The key question of the dissertation is if the book can give something concrete to the management in modern work society. Hietikko has researched the types of leaders in the book, the patterns of management that can be found in it, the governmental structures in Tolkien’s world, and the different types of leadership myths that can be found in the book.

Damn

According to Aamulehti, the Tampere winter swimmers’ sauna has burned down. Might mean we need to find a new place for the annual fandom co-operation meeting.

Ecstatic for a Few Days

I’m a guest blogger at Jeff VanderMeer’s Ecstatic Days this week, sharing the spotlight with Jukkahoo. I’ll probably be mostly talking about Finnish fandom (the first post is up now), so if you’ve been reading this blog, you already pretty much know the things I’ll be saying. But head there anyway to see what Jukka is up to, and do browse the blog further—it’s definitely worth reading.