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The Slummer: Quarters Till Death

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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 My Review: I am a person who likes quiet. My home environment, when I'm able to force my will on my roommate, is free of audio pollution like TV and radio. Perhaps in compensation, I love spy stories and space-war epics and historical novels with battles, explosions, near misses with the main character dangling from rooftops...the very essence of un-quiet. The truth is, I loved it! I could have probably finished this book in one sitting (it was THAT good). But with a few books on the go, I decided to savor this one and enjoy it.

Perfect Gift for a Runner - The Slummer - geoffreysimpson

I find this sort of writing – which has no real plot but is all about exploring characters – very hard to do and I am always lost in admiration when I see it done well. Sophia and Grandmother strike me as absolutely real, but even the cameos are brilliantly described – Jansson has a real flair for these thumbnail character sketches, unusual and specific: There’s a line in The Summer Book by Tove Jansson where the narrator describes the fragility of moss. Residents of the tiny Finnish island where the novel is set are careful to avoid treading on the plant, and it is “only farmers and summer guests” who walk on it. Sometimes people never saw things clearly until it was too late and they no longer had the strength to start again. Or else they forgot their idea along the way and didn’t even realize that they had forgotten”. Both the girl and the woman have wise mouths, and are not hesitant to voice their opinions. One too young to know any better, one too old to care.The grandmother when ill sometimes feels dizzy. She takes Lupatro. I didn’t know what that was, and looked it up and it’s a barbiturate (sedative)...not sure why she would take that if she felt dizzy. It was also an anti-seizure medication used to treat epilepsy. Everything was fine, and yet everything was overshadowed by a great sadness. It was August, and the weather was sometimes stormy and sometimes nice, but for Grandmother, no matter what happened, it was only time on top of time, since everything is vanity and a chasing after the wind.” An elderly woman and her six-year-old granddaughter Sophia spend a summer together on a tiny island in the Gulf of Finland exploring, talking about life, nature, everything but their feelings about Sophia's mother's death and their love for one another. [1] Reception [ edit ] Why do only the very very young or the very very old have time to ponder what heaven is like? Or to bask in the simple act of diving? Or to invent stories about mice and worms and write a novel about a day in their animal lives?

The Summer Book is as ‘A masterpiece’: why Tove Jansson’s The Summer Book is as

Geoffrey is the author of the middle-school aged adventure-mystery series, The Three Hares, and the near-future, speculative fiction novel, The Slummer. Oh, you mean he's dead,’ said Grandmother. She started thinking about all the euphemisms for death, all the anxious taboos that had always fascinated her. It was too bad you could never have an intelligent discussion on the subject. People were either too young or too old, or else they didn't have time.

Some of my favourite moments were the conversations between Grandmother and Sophia. They had me smiling and laughing out loud. In this little novella, we get to experience the relationship of a grandmother and her 6 year old grand daughter who get to spend an entire summer on an island off the coast of Finland. Nature plays a tremendous role in their lives and naturally, they use it to create some very special moments together. These two are such grouches at times and each of them believes she is right and knows what she is talking about often. Sometimes I wondered who was the adult and who was the child! They love each other but they grumble and yet, they can have serious conversations. They talk and learn and often it’s about the tough stuff like what love is, how to pray to God, what Heaven looks like, and when are we going to die. But they have fun, too, learning how to carve animals from branches for their magic forest and talking about what different birds represent. These two take care of each other in their own ways while having fun creating adventures and making up stories. It also feels, as we navigate the climate crisis and generational culture wars, highly relevant. The slim volume tells the story of a grandmother and granddaughter exploring, arguing and playing together during a summer on the island. As Smith puts it: “It would be easy to be sentimental here. Jansson never is.” Instead, she uses this intergenerational relationship to highlight the importance of respect: for one another, for differing opinions and for the planet. It’s a notably open-minded book, which is perhaps reflective of the open-minded life that Jansson and her family lived. Tove’s poking fun at what people might think is normality Grandmother takes cigarette breaks to keep her chatty granddaughter, Sophia, at bay, and she favors crawling, on all fours, when her dizziness is bad. The grandmother isn't quite a substitute, even though at one point Sophia tries to make her more of one, experimenting with calling her: "Mama".

The Summer Book (New York Review Books Classics) The Summer Book (New York Review Books Classics)

Jansson allows little room for sentimentality, her novel is unerringly wise, funny and quite simply put, stunning. On October 20, a new film adaptation of John Williams’s novel Butcher’s Crossing, published by NYRB Classics in 2007, will be released in select movie theaters across the U.S. Directed by Gabe Polsky, the film stars Nicolas Cage as the frontiersman Miller and Fred Hechinger...Lace up for a powerful story of commitment, loss, aspiration and an unlikely challenger of systematic oppression.” Although known first and foremost as an author, Tove Jansson considered her careers as author and painter to be of equal importance. Set in the future and not so unbelievable the rich pay for the genes to be the best of what they aspire their children to be. Working and battling to live with a roof over their heads are the slummers, no money so are natural born no genetic help slummers stay in their place but not Ben his love for running and sheer determination see’s him battling the elite breaking boundaries but life in the slums is hard. Life became harder for Ben when the love of his life Mya was taken in a robbery Ben strives forward for change for Mya. The odd thing is, while I really enjoyed this, it does not make me want to go and read more of Jansson's adult work. Great book! I wouldn’t normally read a fiction book, but I have to say this is a great read, would highly recommend it.

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