£9.99

The Summer Book

by tove jansson

A CLASSIC – AND A BESTSELLER (200,00 COPIES IN THE UK)

An elderly artist and her six-year-old grand-daughter while away a summer together on a tiny island in the gulf of Finland. As the two learn to adjust to each other’s fears, whims and yearnings, a fierce yet understated love emerges – one that encompasses not only the summer inhabitants but the very island itself.

Written in a clear, unsentimental style, full of brusque humour, and wisdom, The Summer Book is a profoundly life-affirming story. Tove Jansson captured much of her own life and spirit in the book, which was her favourite of her adult novels. This new edition, with a Foreword by Esther Freud, sees the return of a European literary gem – fresh, authentic and deeply humane.

Reviews

“Jansson was a genius, a woman of profound wisdom and great artistry, and this is a book to treasure.” Philip Pullman

“Every so often, a book is published that captures something in us … The Summer Book is one of those.” Rachel Simhon, The Daily Telegraph

‘Jansson’s brilliance is to create a narrative that seems, at least, to have no forward motion, to exist in lit moments, gleaming dark moments, like lights on a string, each chapter its own beautifully constructed, random-seeming, complete story. Her writing is all magical deception, her sentences simple and loaded; the novel reads like looking through clear water and seeing, suddenly, the depth ... Jansson was a writer who knew the proper magnitudes of our small worlds.’ Ali Smith, The Guardian

‘This slim, magical, life-affirming novel tells the story of a young girl and her grandmother, who spend their summers together on a small island in the Gulf of Finland. Absent of sentimentality, it is full of love and humor and wisdom.’ Elizabeth Gilbert, The New York Times

‘Tove Jansson distills the essence of the summer – its sunlight and storms – into twenty-two crystalline vignettes. This brief novel tells the story of Sophia, a six-year-old girl awakening to existence, and Sophia’s grandmother, nearing the end of her’s, as they spend the summer on a tiny unspoiled island in the Gulf of Finland ... Jansson creates her own complete world, full of the varied joys and sorrows of life.’ Robert MacFarlane

‘Few books since Robinson Crusoe have evoked the joys of island living so powerfully as this slim Finnish novel ... the story clings on to the imagination like the trusting hand of a child, or the clutch of an elderly woman.’ Jonathan Heawood, The Observer

‘It is beautifully done. What might, in less skilful hands, have been mawkish or twee, maintains to the last sentence a precise and rigorous habit of observation, an acute sense of the play of emotion between people and the landscape they inhabit, and a remarkable ability to render accurately the emotions of the very old and the very young.’ Jane Shilling, The Scotsman

‘The Summer Book’s limpid style belies a deep psychological subtlety. It’s about how people can live close together for months with tact and grace, and about how rich and rewarding even a small world can be.’ Melissa Harrison, The Guardian

‘A marvellously uplifting read, full of gentle humour and wisdom. It deserves to be read not only for the rare beauty of its writing but for the understanding that life, like summer, is precious.’ Justine Picardie, The Daily Telegraph