Young Aleksis Kivi Nominees

The Nuori Aleksis award (“Young Aleksis”), named after Finland’s national writer Aleksis Kivi, is an award founded by the Finnish teachers’ union, given each year to one outstanding and significant book, selected by a jury comprising senior high school students from around Finland.

This year’s shortlist has been announced and I’m happy to report that three of the six nominees are sf. Among the nominees are Teemestarin kirja (Memory of Water) by Emmi Itäranta, Unikoira (Seeing Eyes) by Marko Hautala, and Näkijän tytär (The Prophet’s Daughter) by Kristiina Vuori (more info about the nominees).

A curious thing I noticed in the announcement: the nominees are selected by a large jury of high schoolers, but from a long list (around 100 books) given to them, I guess determined by the working group administering the award. Included are novels, short story and poetry collections, plays and essays. But, even though this is an award for young people by young people, YA books are specifically excluded from eligibility. This feels very stupid to me, especially since nowadays there are (in my opinion) larger amounts of very good quality Finnish YA literature than ever before.

Finndom on Facebook

There’s a new Facebook group called Suomalainen fandom. The purpose is to share information and discuss finndom-related things (I expect the overwhelming majority of the discussions to be in Finnish).

This is a public Facebook group, so it should be possible to read the discussions without signing onto Facebook (at least for the moment). You can also follow new topic posts via an RSS feed.

Vainonen on PW

Publisher's Weekly likes Jyrki Vainonen’s collection The Explorer and Other Stories, coming soon from Cheeky Frawg.

Tove Jansson Bio in English Next Year

A definite Tove Jansson biography Tove Jansson – Tee työtä ja rakasta, written by Dr. Tuula Karjalainen, will be published by Tammi this October. An English edition, The Life and Art of Tove Jansson, will be published next year (coinciding with the 100th anniversary of Tove Jansson) by Penguin Books. Publishing rights have also been sold to Sweden and Japan.

More info

Update: Also the Norwegian rights have been sold. Heinesen Forlag will publish the pub in Norway in 2014.

Pub Meeting Friday

This month’s Turku sf pub meeting is tomorrow (Friday the 6th) at Cosmic Comic Cafe starting at 6. Welcome!

If you had your heart set up on a Thursday meeting, today is the last Varjomafia at the Terrakoti club house before the move, also starting around 6. Should be plenty of people there, especially as today has also been open house there due to the University season start. Or, if you’re more interested in having a pint, a couple of fans from Helsinki are visiting today; text me for details (040 576 6450).

Free Tainaron Ebook Today

To support the Helsinki Worldcon bid, Ann and Jeff VanderMeer’s Cheeky Frawg Books if offering a free ebook edition of Leena Krohn’s short novel Tainaron, for today only (until midnight EST, ie. 7 AM Wednesday morning Finnish time). More info on Jeff’s site.

Rabbit Back Out

The Rabbit Back Literature Society is the excellent debut novel by the Finnish author Pasi Ilmari Jääskeläinen. It’s a literary mystery set in a small town where there is a secret society of writers with mysterious rituals and a strange past. The English translation of the novel will be out in November from Pushkin Press. Check it out—I’m certain you won’t be disappointed.