Tuomas Kärkkäinen: The Illustrated Book of Awelings. A Field Guide for Spotting Creatures

Have you ever wondered why birds often rest on statues’ heads or what is the parentage of concrete roadblocks?

Author: Tuomas Kärkkäinen
Finnish original: Suomen ämminkäiset värikuvina
Publisher: S&S, 2021
Genre: Illustrated children’s fiction
Number of pages: 42 pp.
Reading material: Finnish original, English sample

Rights sold: Estonia, Elust enesest

How on earth do street lamps break? If you ask grownups these questions, they often just go, “I don’t really know” or “They just do”. The reason for this is that they have not heard of awelings.

You cannot blame grownups for not knowing about them, for awelings are extremely difficult to spot. In fact, it is impossible to see them, because they are masters of hiding – but not seeing something does not disprove its existence.

The Illustrated Book of Awelings is an enchanting book about awelings living in cities, who offer explanations for humming pipes, broken kerbstones, splashes on walls and noisy traffic lights. The book, written as a catalogue, introduces the creatures with spellbinding names who leave these footprints: amplius, shackhie, hazeantler, jemmyvaulter…

With tips and tasks, the readers are taught to spot the most fascinating phenomena in an urban environment. Never before has a children’s book presented stony cities in such spellbinding guise!

About the author:
Tuomas Kärkkäinen