Parables from Paradise: A Selection of Dreams and Magical Tales

A prominent and attractive feature of Topelius’s tales are descriptions and interactions with Nature, as well as concern for the poor. Most importantly, the stories are well crafted and engaging, the storylines keep your attention by taking unexpected and dramatic turns. You want to read them to the end to find out what happens. So, read on!

Children’s stories for grown-ups too! Are you ready for adventures? Don’t you often find that on your way, something unexpected happens? This story collection chronicles the escapades of young people in Finland in days gone by. Follow them as they engage with nature and meet strange creatures. They discover the power of magic and dreams and get back home safely, maybe a little wiser.

Fatal Gambit

The second Rekke/Vargas mystery.

Claire Lidman died fourteen years ago. So why does she appear in the background of a recent holiday snap taken in Venice?

Her husband brings the anomaly to Hans Rekke and Micaela Vargas. Initial scepticism gives way to cautious belief, but Rekke is falling apart again and Vargas has her own problems. Her gangster brother is threatening to silence her if she doesn’t get off his case.

Meanwhile, Rekke’s daughter Julia has a new boyfriend she’s determined to keep secret. He sees something in her she can’t see herself, but there are hints of a darker side.

Most troubling of all, Rekke is hearing whispers of a name he hasn’t heard for years. A rival from his youth whose restless evil links all the threads in this incipient case. The pieces are laid and he’s already one move ahead. The name of the game is revenge.

A Home – The World of Carl and Karin Larsson

A book about life at Lilla Hyttnäs in Dalarna, home of Carl and Karin Larsson, in the late 19th century.

A book about life at Lilla Hyttnäs in Dalarna, home of Carl and Karin Larsson, in the late 19th century. Written by Ulrika Ewerman, with photographs by Mira Wickman, translation by Ian Giles, and styling by Elsa Billgren.

The Dunning-Kruger Effect

An over-educated, under-employed man struggles to complete his novel and get his life together over the course of one scorching hot Swedish summer in this clever, provocative, and hilarious novel that is already an acclaimed sensation abroad.

Convinced of his own moral and intellectual superiority, the nameless protagonist of this debut novel is also paralyzed by self-consciousness. Yet, inspired by Stephen King’s On Writing, he decides to dedicate four hours a day to work on his own novel over the course of one summer. Only, he must also balance his creative goals with a part-time government job and looking after his girlfriend’s possibly brain-damaged Pomeranian dog.

Too bad he’s uninspired by his job, almost kills the dog, and realizes his novel is slowly morphing into misguided fan fiction about French writer and enfant terrible Michel Houellebecq.

Even when he’s alone, he can’t help but pontificate before an imagined audience, making over-the-top cases for and against all manner of culture war battles, referencing everyone from Spike Lee to Grumpy Cat. He obsesses over identity politics, and veers into dangerous territory as he and his androgynous girlfriend engage in sexual role-play. He’s an emblem of all the follies of our age—happily unaware that in his refusal to be ordinary, he’s become a walking cliché of misguided manhood.

The Dunning-Kruger Effect is a portrait of a person belatedly coming of age, a blistering takedown of a privileged man who believes he’s a revolutionary, and “a crackling firework display of comic brilliance” (Svenska Dagbladet, Sweden).

The Rocks Will Echo Our Sorrow

‘The Rocks Will Echo Our Sorrow’ is a polyphonic, elegaic testimony to the Indigenous Northern Sámi people forcibly displaced from their homeland along the Norwegian seaboard in the first half of the twentieth century. Published by the University of Minnesota Press.

‘The Rocks Will Echo Our Sorrow’ is a polyphonic, elegaic testimony to the Indigenous Northern Sámi people forcibly displaced from their homeland along the Norwegian seaboard in the first half of the twentieth century.

Published by the University of Minnesota Press.

The Oyster Diver’s Secret

Heart-warming adult fiction about female friendship.

Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award 2024.

Nobel: The Enigmatic Alfred and His Prizes

This is the fascinating story of the path from Alfred Nobel’s youth to the high-stakes drama that enveloped the dynamite king’s last will and testament.

The telegram reaches Sweden on the morning of Friday, 10 December 1896. Sixty-three-year-old Alfred Nobel has passed away quickly and unexpectedly during the night, at his villa  in the Italian city of San Remo. The news makes it into Afton­bladet the same day. ‘Every educated Swede feels sorrow at  the loss of one of their greatest countrymen,’ writes the news-paper, while avoiding the question that will soon be on every-one’s lips: Who will now inherit his riches?

 

NOBEL: The Enigmatic Alfred and His Prizes is the fascinating story of the path from Alfred Nobel’s youth to the high-stakes drama that enveloped the dynamite king’s last will and testament. Set against the backdrop of cities such as St Petersburg, Hamburg and Paris, and framed by family quarrels, heartbreak, successes and betrayals, NOBEL is also a captivating account of nineteenthcentury Europe that explores its political currents, literary treasures and scienti?c genius. This is a story about breaking boundaries.

The awardwinning author, journalist and member of the Swedish Academy, Ingrid Carlberg, has combed through archives in multiple countries, unearthing hitherto unknown sources that cast new light on the man who dreamed of doing good for humanity. She combines the researcher’s scholarly rigour with the readability and verve of a narrative journalist. In NOBEL, she has written the first cohesive, comprehensive work to tell the story of Alfred Nobel and the background to the Nobel prizes.

Cookies & Crumbs: Chunky, Chewy, Gooey Cookies for Every Mood

Some like ‘em gooey and chewy, others chunky and crunchy, but everybody loves cookies.

Whether it’s classics like Milk Choc Chip, Peanut Butter and Chunky Double Choc, or new favourites – think Coffee and Cardamom or Melt-in-the-middle S’mores – you’ll find endless options for baking cookies at home with these unforgettable flavour combinations, as well as an array of unbeatable vegan and gluten-free recipes.

In this fun-filled, fresh-out-of-the-oven celebration of everyone’s favourite sweet treat, Kaja Hengstenberg keeps things simple, guides you through the basics and presents delicious, doable recipes. With handy tips scattered throughout, alongside ideas for using up leftovers – ice cream sandwich, anyone? – these are recipes that will show you how to make seriously good cookies every single time.

The Cuckoo

Detective Patrik Hedström and Erica Falck are back exploring threads of the past woven into the present and old sins that have left long shadows.

As a heavy mist rolls into the Swedish coastal town of Fjällbacka, shocking violence shakes the small community to its core. Rolf Stenklo, a famous photographer, is found murdered in his gallery. Two days later, a brutal tragedy on a private island leaves the prestigious Bauer family devastated.

With his boss acting strangely, Detective Patrik Hedström is left to lead the investigation. Tensions rise threatening cracks in the team of officers at Tanumshede police station and pressure mounts as the press demand answers.

In pursuit of inspiration for her next true-crime book, Patrik’s wife Erica Falck leaves behind their three children and travels to Stockholm to research the unsolved decades-old murder of a figure from Rolf’s past. As Erica searches for the truth, she realizes that her mystery is connected to Patrik’s case. These threads from the past are woven into the present and old sins leave behind long shadows.

The Emotion Trap

Practical and accessible self-help guide for depression, stress, anxiety and procrastination from a clinical psychologist.

Why negative feelings hold you back and how small changes can set you free: a psychologist’s toolkit for modern life.

Hunter in Huskvarna and other stories

A boy goes missing from a Swedish town. A police officer’s mistress cares for his dying wife. A woman becomes obsessed with her psychoanalyst’s daughter. These stories together form a dizzying portrait of love and survival.

Eleven stories spanning raw reality and fairy tale, held together by a sense of longing: for escape from the mundaneness of a prescribed life, for a past which promises an undiscovered future, for a place or a person that fees like home.

Will You Care if I Die?

Will You Care If I Die? is a powerful memoir about social class, race, friendship and unexpected love, and a blazingly topical exploration of social polarization and the rise of the far right. In Sweden, where children murder children and where gun violence is the worst in Europe, Nicolas Lunabba’s job as a social organizer with Malmö’s underclass requires firm boundaries …

Will You Care If I Die? is a powerful memoir about social class, race, friendship and unexpected love, and a blazingly topical exploration of social polarization and the rise of the far right.

In Sweden, where children murder children and where gun violence is the worst in Europe, Nicolas Lunabba’s job as a social organizer with Malmö’s underclass requires firm boundaries and emotional detachment. But all that changes when he meets Elijah – an unruly teenage boy of mixed heritage whose perilous future reminds Nicolas of his own troubled and violent past.

Allowing Elijah into his home and then into his heart, Nicolas crosses one of his own red lines. With the odds stacked against them, and completely unprepared for the journey he and Elijah now set off on together, can Nicolas keep Elijah safe from harm and steer him towards a better future? Written as a letter to Elijah, Will You Care If I Die? tells Nicolas and Elijah’s story – and asks us to reimagine what it means to care for one another in an uncaring world.

The Mountain King

This atmospheric and sinister mystery, tinged with Scandinavian folklore, follows an overachieving female inspector investigating the darkest sides of humanity.

Criminal inspector Leonore Asker seems to have the leading position at Malmö’s Major Crime Division within reach. But things go awry when, in the middle of a high-profile kidnapping case, management relegates her to the so-called Department of Lost Souls—the unit for odd, cold cases banished to the basement of the police station.

Despite the humiliation, Asker is drawn into one of the more peculiar cases. Someone is placing small ominous figures in town and one of them seems to represent the missing woman from the kidnapping case. As Asker’s investigation takes her to abandoned buildings, she reaches out to a local architecture expert and together they explore the sinister recesses of the city and discover that an unusual kind of evil lurks in the shadows.

Knits for Dogs

Sweaters, toys and blankets for your furry friend.

16 knitted garments, toys and accessories designed for dogs. The instructions are clear, the photographs are fabulous, and the book includes detailed instructions, with photographs, on felting and different cast-on and cast-off techniques.

Albert Bonnier, his life and times

The story of Sweden’s first modern publisher.

A fascinating biography of the founder of the Bonnier publishing house from his arrival in Sweden, following in the footsteps of his brother Adolf, in 1835 to his death in 1900. Besides an in-depth look at nineteenth-century literary Sweden (Albert Bonnier knew everyone and Strindberg does not come off well), the book also addresses the historical context, the constraints faced by Jewish immigrants to Sweden in the early 1800s, changes in the rules on settlement and antisemitism as the century progressed. The issues it raises on immigration, assimilation and freedom of speech remain relevant today.

Restyle & Restitch for Little Ones

30 sewing projects to turn your preloved clothes into great baby and toddler outfits.

“Fed up with the way the mountain of clothes in your wardrobe – and across the planet – just keeps on growing? This book is packed with ideas for things to make from clothes you aren’t wearing any more.”

When recycling, re-using and saving money are on everyone’s minds, this is a practical and creative guide to turning your own old clothes into clothes for your baby (or someone else’s). Patterns for the 30 garments and accessories are included, in different sizes, and the book features instructions on sizing, sewing and fabric printing.

Linnea Larsson is an architect by profession and her instructions are clear, enthusiastic and encouraging.

 

The Lazy Way to a Wonderful Life – at home and at work, by Gunnel Ryner

Improve your environment to improve your life! Are you tired of fighting an uphill battle and constantly having to rely on your own willpower, motivation and self-discipline? Would you like to learn a smarter, simpler way to get the life you’ve always dreamed of – both at home and at work? Gunnel Ryner overturns the traditional view of self-development and …

Improve your environment to improve your life!

Are you tired of fighting an uphill battle and constantly having to rely on your own willpower, motivation and self-discipline? Would you like to learn a smarter, simpler way to get the life you’ve always dreamed of – both at home and at work?

Gunnel Ryner overturns the traditional view of self-development and success, in which it’s all about you, and instead shows how you can create an environment – with the right people, things, places, conditions and ideas – that simply draws you in the direction you want to go.

With a light-hearted blend of science, humour and relevant examples, she demonstrates the positive aspects of laziness and shows how the right environment is more important than willpower. The book also provides you with a step-by-step method that makes it easy and fun to get where you want, both in your own life and together with your colleagues at work.

The Wild Game Cookbook: Simple Recipes for Hunters and Gourmets, by Mikael Einarsson and Hubbe Lemon

The Wild Game Cookbook is a recipe book for aspiring chefs, hunters and hands-on gourmets interested in the world of wild game. Rediscover this organic, sustainable and versatile meat through delicious recipes, from fine dining to everyday meals. If you’re already a hunter, our aim with this book is to spark an interest in cooking really good wild game. Maybe …

The Wild Game Cookbook is a recipe book for aspiring chefs, hunters and hands-on gourmets interested in the world of wild game. Rediscover this organic, sustainable and versatile meat through delicious recipes, from fine dining to everyday meals.
If you’re already a hunter, our aim with this book is to spark an interest in cooking really good wild game. Maybe nobody ever said “The better the chef, the better the hunter”, but we think it’s true all the same. If you do everything to make sure the final dish is as good as possible, you’ll also make sure you shoot really well. Learning more about cooking game means less wild-caught meat ends up becoming ground meat for lack of inspiration.
If you feel you can get something enjoyable from every aspect of the hunt – the preparations, practice, the actual hunting situation and preparing and cooking the animal – then hunting is truly something for you, and you have a lifetime of community, fantastic natural experiences, and great meals before you.

The Mystery of Helmersbruk Manor

Captivating middle-grade mystery set in a haunted manor in 1960s Finland.

Read more here.

The Night Raven

Bestselling YA crime thriller set in brutal 19th century Stockholm. First book of The Moonwind Mysteries series.

Winner of the Children’s Book Council Favourite Award 2024.

Winner of the August Prize 2021 in Sweden.

Winner of the Crimetime Award.

1795: The Order of the Furies

In 1795: The Order of the Furies, the third instalment of Niklas Natt och Dag’s historical noir trilogy, we are plunged once again into the bustling world of late eighteenth-century Stockholm. The city is teetering on a precipice, with evil shaking its core, but can love and friendship prevail?

It is 1795 and evil lurks in the winding alleys of Stockholm. Tycho Ceton prowls the city, willing to do anything to survive and reclaim the honour he has lost. No one knows what he is planning next but Emil Winge, haunted by the ghosts of his past, is determined to stop him. Meanwhile, Jean Mickel Cardell is preoccupied with his own search for Anna Stina Knapp. She may have in her possession a letter which could have devastating consequences in the wrong hands.

All the while, hell looms inexorably . . .

The Mystery of Raspberry Hill

Chilling middle-grade ghost story set in a spooky sanatorium in 1920s Finland.

Read more here at Penguin.

Rhubarb Lemonade

Poignant coming-of-age drama about a young girl dealing with first love and her parents’ divorce.

Winner of the August Prize 2019 in Sweden.