Month: February 2026

Welcome to Grandma’s by Nora Lehtinen & Mari Nikula is travelling to Denmark, where it will be published by Gads.

Wonderful news from our children’s list: Gads has secured the Danish rights to Welcome to Grandma’s by Nora Lehtinen & Mari Nikula, marking the first deal for this title.

Welcome to Grandma’s is the first in a series of picture books that celebrates the unique bond between children and grandparents. For little Miisa, spending time at Grandma’s is her favorite thing in the world: at Grandma’s there’s always something fun to do. Miisa, Grandma and Grandpa play, eat, and enjoy the garden together.

As the story advances, readers are encouraged to step in and play with Miisa bringing out their inner detective and finding objects in the pictures. The book is both sweet and highly entertaining, offering just the right balance between action and coziness to make this book an instant favourite for young readers and their (grand)parents.

Nora Lehtinen is a children’s and young adult author and communications educator. She is particularly interested in special education, plain language, and functional storytelling.

Mari Nikula is an illustrator and graphic designer whose illustrations have previously been featured in publications such as Koululainen magazine.
Welcome to Grandma’s is their first collaboration, and the book is published in Finland by Orava Books, a children’s imprint of Siltala Publishing.

Gads is an independent Danish publishing house, whose list boasts a selection of literary fiction and non-fiction titles for adults, and a collection of children’s literature for all ages.

Warmest congratulations to the authors and the publisher, and don’t miss out on this title!

Radio Popov is travelling to Japan, where it will be published by Mizuiro Books, marking the 26th foreign language territory for this title.

Mizuiro Books have secured the Japanese rights to Radio Popov by Anja Portin, one of the most successful children’s books of the last decade, marking the 26th foreign language territory for this title. Radio Popov follows Alfred, a nine-year-old boy who lives virtually alone. His father is constantly busy with work and business trips, and his mom isn’t in the picture. During one of his dad’s prolonged absences Alfred is left alone for so long he runs out of food, and electricity is cut off.

When everything seems lost, Alfred is saved by a mysterious stranger who delivers food and woollen socks in lonely children’s letterboxes. It is the beginning of a wonderful adventure that will lead Alfred to a new family, and to saving more forgotten children. Alfred’s story is moving, and touches on social issues, but also contains joy, friendship, and a happy ending.

Anja Portin has quickly become a favourite among children’s authors with her middle grade novel Radio Popov. She writes about children who take matters into their own hands when grownups do not want to take responsibility or are not there to do it. 

Mizuiro Books is a Japanese publishing house with a special focus on high-quality literature from the Nordics. They are the Japanese home of timeless classics like Sinuhe The Egyptian by Mika Waltari and several contemporary Finnish titles.

Warm congratulations to the author and the publisher!

Zona 42 has secured the Italian rights to Tainaron by Leena Krohn, marking the 14th foreign language territory for this title.

Wonderful news: Tainaron: Mail from Another City by Leena Krohn is travelling to Italy, where it will be published by Zona 42.
Tainaron is an adventure taking place in a city inhabited by human-sized insects. The narrator talks about the city, its curious creatures and their enchanting lives. Letter by letter, little by little, also the narrator starts to blend into the city’s collective mind. Tainaron has been named as one of the most important works of post-World War II dark fantasy and was a nominee for several literary prizes.

Leena Krohn is a modern classic of Finnish literature. Her extensive body of work draws from fantasy and sci-fi, each and every novel dodging presumptions and excelling expectations.

Zona 42 is an independent publisher whose list focuses on a selection of sci-fi, speculative and genre-bending fiction.

Warm congratulations to the author and the publisher!

The Silk Road North series by Anu Ojala has now sold over 60.000 copies in Finland alone.

Exciting news from our crime list: the Silk Road North series by Anu Ojala has sold over 60.000 copies in Finland, consolidating its position as a readers’ favourite and a top-tier series in its genre.

The series follows twin city Tornio-Haparanda, on the Swedish-Finnish border in Lapland, has been plagued by a crime wave which keeps claiming new victims. Sergeant Ronja Jentzch investigates murders that lead to the trail of a dangerous synthetic drug. As police feverishly work on the case, a more complex web of connections is revealed, and international meddling becomes a part of the picture.

The series consists of Silk Road North (2021), Death Knell (2023) , and The Skynet (2024).

Among the strengths of the series are the credible portrayal of investigative procedures as well as characters that are written with depth and compassion. In Ojala’s books, crimes are often created by desperate circumstances and committed by people just like us, who are simply looking for a way to a better life. At the same time, the tension remains until the last pages of each book, and the fact that the investigation expands and deepens with each part of the trilogy gives the books a quality of a high-calibre, bingeable TV series. The rights to the series have been pre-empted in Germany by Droemer Knaur.

Anu Ojala (b.1972) is an author and lawyer living in Rovaniemi in the Finnish Lapland who knows the background of the Arctic drug war well. She has worked in a law firm and at the University of Lapland, and has previously written novels for young readers. The Silk Road North series is published in Finland by Gummerus.

Warm congratulations to the author and the publisher on this wonderful success, and don’t miss out on this title!

Professor Henrik Meinander has been awarded with the Karl Emil Tollander Award and the Tollanderska Medal by the Society of Swedish Literature in Finland.

Another accolade is in for one of our most prominent non-fiction authors Henrik Meinander: he has been awarded the Karl Emil Tollander Prize, worth 50.000 euros, and the Tollanderska Medal by the Society of Swedish Literature in Finland for his latest book Helsinki. Story of a City.

The Karl Emil Tollander Award, is the largest award given by the Society of Swedish Literature in Finland, and is handed out at the SLS Annual Celebration on 5 February. The award is given in recognition to a literary or scientific lifetime achievement and is one of the awards boasting the largest monetary value in the Nordics, and has been awarded since 1913.

The Society has stated “in his academic career Henrik Meinander has combined influential scientific contributions with elegant historiography for a broad audience. Helsinki. Story of a City is an excellent example of this. With a steady hand Meinander brings to life his beloved home city’s history. He carries the reader through Helsinki’s growth and its soon five-centuries-long development, formed by the changing forces of the surroundings and geopolitics. Meinander also admirably depicts how the soul of a city is created mostly by the people who live in it, the language and living conditions, the street life, the architecture, and the culture.”

In Helsinki. Story a City Henrik Meinander, one of Finland’s most prominent historians, explores the development of the Finnish capital from a tiny fishing village to a contemporary Nordic metropolis, placing the events that characterized the city in a broader historical context. 

Henrik Meinander (b. 1960) is a professor of history at theUniversity of Helsinki and the author of many acclaimed books on Finnish and Nordic history. He was formerly curator of the Mannerheim Museum in Helsinki and head of the Finnish Institute in Stockholm. His works have been translated into over 10 languages, and are non-fiction bestsellers in Finland

Warmest congratulations to the author!