New Book by Tove Jansson Released, excerpt from the Independent, with thanks

Art in Nature, By Tove Jansson

Dreamlike trip through the magic of life

Christian House

Sunday 08 July 2012

When reading anything by Tove Jansson, one cannot quite ignore the looming hippo-shaped shadow of the Finnish author's legendary creation, the Moomins. At the time of her death in 2001, those loveable, large-snouted trolls had made Jansson an international name, one synonymous with a particularly Scandinavian take on children's books. And that is how it would have remained if it hadn't been for Sort of Books posthumously publishing her novel, The Summer Book, two years later....

The latest fiction of Jansson's to be translated and published in Britain is Art in Nature, a sublime little collection of stories that is full of boats and beach houses, painting and plays.... In "White Lady", three middle-aged ladies, one of them a novelist, enjoy a night out with youngsters at a seaside restaurant. "I write books for young people and they don't know who I am," ponders the writer. "And I know nothing about them, either. Funny, isn't it." It's a bittersweet scene for Jansson to have composed; she entertained a generation of children but had none herself.