1. The hammer goes to sleep
Karin Erlandsson, Karoliina Pertamo: Juno lights the moon (S&S) 2+
Juno lights the moon. Night is coming. Cars fall asleep in stables, eagles fall asleep on a branch, octopuses fall asleep in the sea, hammers in the toolbox and pots in the dishwasher.
The publisher promises that the reading book will help little readers fall asleep. That's a lot promised. It would take about 300 pages of sleeping badgers and excavators to put my own test reader to sleep. Nevertheless, both I and the test reader enjoyed the book's gentle alternate rhythm and Karoliina Pertamon illustrations.
Aino Frilander
2. The watchman does not disappoint
Saara Kekäläinen, Reetta Niemensivu: Valpuri and huge clothing chaos (Tammi) 3+
Charming Valpuri has struggled with morning porridge and brushing his teeth in the previous books. There is a huge chaos of clothes to browse through in the latest Valpuri book. It requires resourcefulness from Valpur and superhuman patience from his father. Clothes just want to tickle, wrap, squeeze, grind and capture. Even the dinosaurs died out in Takuu because they had to wear tights. There is the familiar style of butt-sweating and sock-sweating humor that appeals to readers.
Vigilante and dangerous morning porridge is still the best of the Valpuri books, but the novelty has already conquered one kindergarten group.
Aino Frilander
3. How to sleep on May Day?
Kaija Pannula, Silja-Maria Wihersaari: Sleep, May Day! (WSOY) 3+
to sleep, First of May! in the book Elsa the hippopotamus, monkeys Oranki and Marenki and teddy bears Toffo and Poffo feverishly prepare for Vapu's bedtime. The room is ventilated, the dinner apples are peeled and the schedule finalized. The exhausted animals would rather do something else, but it doesn't help, Vappu has to be put to bed.
Silja-Maria Wihersaaren in the illustrations, the character of Vapu beating the hula hoop, shaking, stirring and gobbling eyeball chocolate balls appeals to all lovers of unruly child heroes. Parents who need peer support get it from hippos, monkeys and crocodiles.
Aino Frilander
4. Leo's big pity
Nina Pirhonen: Leo Leijona agrees to a fight. (Huge) 3+
Leo Leijona is building a shelter in the kindergarten with Papu, Kosmo and Miska. Maja will be really great, but then everyone wants to play a different game. It's going to be a fight. The hurt grows and grows until Leo and the friends learn that even though apologizing is really hard, it has a wonderful effect.
Pirhonen has also illustrated the British one Donna David's car, plane and train books. The colorful illustrations in the Leo books are also particularly delicious, perhaps a little at the expense of the text. Still, the emotions conveyed by the text are also familiar to kindergarteners and their parents.
Aino Frilander
5. For stand-up parents of their own lives
David Sundin: The book that absolutely did not want to be read (January) 3+
The keys loose! Don't open me! Hide me!
By David Sundin is a screenwriter, television presenter and comedian, whose firstborn A book that didn't want to be read became the best-selling children's book of the year in Sweden. Its translation rights were sold to 30 countries. Now it has got a sequel.
The book gives its reader electric shocks, confuses him in his words and forces him to argue with him. Sundin's main idea seems to be to give an adult a script for a hilarious stand-up show that makes the children's audience howl with laughter.
However, Sundin's book makes me a little nervous; as if he believes that children don't want to listen to ordinary stories. Maybe not all children really want to, and maybe for them Sundin's book is an eye-opening experience.
Aino Frilander
6. Nollis excites both children and adults
Tuomas Marjamäki, Antti Nikunen: Nollis – Expensive nettle and other stories (Wsoy) 5+
In Pönttölä the world's only zero-horned Nollis, who lives on a farm, continues his adventures in the sequel, which is hilarious from the cover. Expensive nettle, Nollis konkonen, of course! The hilarity continues throughout the book, when Nollis and his donkey friend, sorry zebra without stripes, Sahrami wonder about the expensive nettle, for example, about Eliel and old times.
Mixed Antti Nikusen illustration that Tuomas Marjamäki the text always works on at least two levels. An adult's eye rests on Nikunen's simplified drawing style, while a child, on the other hand, marvels at the repeated triangular shape in the opening pictures of the chapters, which the adult did not even notice. In Marjamäki's words, again, not everything opens up to the child – which clearly makes him happy – while an adult can decide when the fun will increase if he explains, for example, shingles and wall roses, Serlokki Nollis and Dr. Vatsanen, or the days that even magpies are actually good to have sometimes.
Sanna Kangasniemi
7. Beautiful, colorful friendship
Ilja Karsikas: Rainbow Skier (S&S) 6+
Bridge times Ilja Karsikaswhich Unicorn-in his picture book bravely dealt with his father's alcohol problem, takes the reader on the winding paths of friendship. Malla and Riina have an argument in the middle of the game and Riina leaves slamming the doors. Annoying Malla!
Even though being alone is boring, Riina doesn't want to settle down. However, the intoxicating chirping persistently heard throughout the city changes things.
Because of Karsikka's wonderfully colored and expressive illustrations, you have to go through the story again immediately after reading it – looking at the pictures.
Sanna Kangasniemi
8. Different friends on city trips
Leena Krohn: Friend of the heart (Teos, gem) 9+
In poetic form the story of the friendship between the lady and the fringed woman takes Sellsing to a city that could be mistaken for Helsinki, so much does it resemble it. Leena Krohn's through the delicate illustration made by myself, the reader can get involved in the life of a lady and a special friend, to which cultural excursions and café life are essential.
The charming poetic rhythm remains in your head while the work awakens you to think about big questions: what is the role of nature in the city, can you be a friend despite being different, what does it feel like to give up when it's for the good of another.
Sanna Kangasniemi
9. Saviors of the fantasy world
Tim Probert: Lightfall 1: The Last Flame (Lightfall: The Girl & the Galdurian). Finnish Kati Valli. WSOY. 256 pp. 9+
Tim Probert not reinventing the wheel – and that's fine. The last flame kick off Lightfall– a cartoon saga in which young Bea has to leave her home on a long journey through Irpa's fantasy land to defeat evil and save the world.
Miyazaki's and Tolkien's spirit is strongly involved in the story, but through the fine images of Probert, who works as the artistic director of the Aardman Nathan Love animation studio, the world is still completely his own.
Bea is the adopted child of the wise Wizard Pig, and their job is to guard the eternal fire. In the forest, Bea meets Cadi, who is looking for Pig Wizard, whose Galduuri tribe has long been thought to have disappeared.
However, the pig wizard has disappeared. During the search trip, it becomes clear that an ancient enemy has awakened and threatens to plunge the world into eternal darkness. And who is Bea herself? Probert perfectly describes Bea's overwhelming sadness and confusion, the freezing fear of her own failure.
The atmosphere of the award-winning cartoon is still bright and light, full of funny details and the power of friendship.
Arla Kanerva
10. Flashes of youth
Tapani Bagge: Cruel Love. Aviator. 118 pp. 14 +
Boys and young men don't read, is reported with increasing concern year after year. I met Bagge a compact collection of short stories Cruel love is a welcome answer to the cry: a book for those who rarely find themselves in books.
Tommi robs a store, Jenni returns a cell phone that fell on the ground to an unknown grandmother, Tatu gets a tattoo and the brothers go carjacking. The boys' band is joined by the wonderful Maritta, who evokes all kinds of emotions.
Awarded Laivakello for his children's books, Bagge's style is concise and smooth, without unnecessary underlining. Cruel love the short stories offer recognizable glimpses of youth that one can only hope will find their target audience.
Arla Kanerva
11. A hanging rainbow story
Johan Ehn: Horse boys (Hästpojkarna). Finnish Sirje Niitepõld. Big Dipper. 349 pp. 14+
For young people oriented rainbow literature in Finland has long been gratifyingly open and courageous. Sweden also knows how to: Johan Ehnin Horse boys is a great and touching overview of the recent history of LGBTQ people not only in the Nordic countries, but also more widely in Europe.
The novel intertwines two time planes that run through different decades. In the present, there is Anton, a boy from Stockholm who works in a care home for the elderly. On a home visit, he gets to know Alexander Kovac, almost a hundred years old, who has fortified himself in the kitchen and refuses to talk. Anton finds mysterious old photographs in the old man's home, but also a letter from the Gestapo.
In 1920s Prague, Sasha runs away from the orphanage with his friend Janek and joins the circus. The boys discover that they feel more than just friendship for each other. As circus performers, they are praised. In Berlin they find a queer community where they can be exactly who they are. For a while everything is great, but Hitler's the brown shirts are already on the move.
In 2020, Ehn's novel received the Nils Holgersson award and was also nominated for the Nordic Council's children's and youth literature award. Five of the age limit: Horse boys works equally well for adults. It's a sobering reminder that we need to know our history in order to avoid repeating its worst mistakes.
Arla Kanerva
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