Stop the Thief!, Ulla Donner’s debut picture book, is running for the prestigious Runeberg Junior Prize.
We’re very happy to announce that Stop the Thief! by Ulla Donner has been nominated for the prestigious Runeberg Prize. The jury committee have motivated their choice stating:
Stop the Thief! (Stoppa tjuven, S&S 2025)
“This book about a dog being a thief is a festive and fast-paced repetition story in rhyme about catching the thief, with skillful and clever humorous illustrations and comical details. It mainly targets children between the ages of 3 and 6, but it can be read by all age groups.”
The Runeberg Junior Prize is given yearly in two categories – adult fiction and children’s literature – and is often considered to be the most important literary award after Finlandia. The winners are traditionally announced on February 5th, the National Runeberg’s Day.
Author Ulla Donner
Stop the Thief! is a funny wild chase after a dog who has been stealing other dogs’ most prized possession. The story advances in rhyme – with a generous dose of humor – and the thief is eventually caught, but the journey along the way is filled with warm and funny illustrations, and representation for as many dog breeds as possible.
Ulla Donner is one of the most prominent illustrators in the Nordics. She was awarded the Puupäähattu Prize and the Urhunden Prize for her Natural Comedy, among other. Stop the Thief! is her debut in the picture book genre. All her works are published in Finland by Schildts & Söderströms.
Warmest congratulations to the author and the publisher, and fingers crossed!
Amazing news for authors Tomi Kontio, Marjo Niemi, and Jarkko Volanen, who are now running for this year’s Finlandia Prize.
The nominees for the biggest literary prize in Finland have been announced – and HLA is so proud to represent three of them!
Marjo Niemi and Jarkko Volanen are nominated for Finlandia Prize for fiction, and Tomi Kontio received a Finlandia Junior nomination for children’s literature. All three authors are published in Finland by Teos, an imprint of Siltala Publishing.
Finlandia Prize is the most important literary award in Finland given annually in three categories: the best adult fiction work; the best children’s or YA book; and the best nonfiction book of the year. The winner is always chosen out of 6 nominees in each category, and the award sum is 30,000 euros for each.
Marjo Niemi is nominated for her new novel A Low-Budget War Film – a sharp and darkly humorous study of class identity in what’s supposed to be the happiest country in the world.
In the novel, the narrator, who has long ago escaped to a big city, returns to her hometown after her father’s death. The town factory once offered the residents not only work and a livelihood, but also housing, school, daycare, healthcare, and hobbies. All that is left here now is a burned-down shopping centre and angst.
A Low-Budget War Film is not one of those working-class novels in which the spirit of the united grows into a collective force. Rather, with its ruthless directness, the novel shows how class identity is fragmented into individual pursuits, and the shame is inherited throughout generations.
Finlandia Jury has stated: A carnevalesque war campaign to the mind of a dead father and the history of one working class family. The milieu of a deprecating factory town points out that the Finnish class society is a materialistic, and tangible, reality. The writer’s language is absolutely of a caliber of its own: rough and jubilant. A cutting literary analysis of intergenerational trauma is by turns terrifying, by turns hilarious to read.
Niemi is no stranger to Finlandia Prize nominations: her previous novel, Hearing (2021), was a nominee too. She was also awarded the prestigious Runeberg Prize for The Mother of All Losses (2017). Among the most prominent themes in Niemi’s prose are questions of who gets to be heard, seen, and noticed, often punctuated with pungent, dark humor.
Jarkko Volanen is nominated for his third novel, Signal Fires – a deeply emotional story of terror, fictional identities, and the love that binds people together.
The novel follows two sets of characters that clash in the metropolis of an oppressive regime: brothers Viktor and Valdemar, and lovers Anna and Elena. Drawing inspiration from a true story of a couple seeking asylum in Finland on the basis of persecution for sexual orientation, and relying on atmospheres and plot twists worthy of a John Le Carré novel, Signal Fires explores in a page-turning narration the way in which individuals can escape authoritarian oppression to save the ones they love – or at least try.
Finlandia Jury has stated“A frighteningly realistic and topical portrayal of totalitarian regime, that shows how political persecution and structural violence damage individual people and their relationships. The narrative doesn’t try to indulge the reader; instead, it gives space for multi-layered characters and pressing themes. The prologue of the novel is one of the most impressive descriptions of a city in Finnish literature.”
Jarkko Volanen is a writer and a PhD researcher living in Helsinki. His second novel, The Shadow People (2020), was longlisted for the prestigious Runeberg Prize.
One of the six Finlandia Junior nominations for children’s and YA literature went to HLA author Tomi Kontio and his book A Dog Called Cat Says Farewell. The book completes the beloved Dog Called Cat series about a lovely dog called Cat, her human friend Weasel, and their cat companion called Dog.
The three friends have travelled together for five picture books, starting with A Dog Called Cat, published in 2015. The series were conjured together with the famous illustrator Elina Warsta. It tells a story of an unlikely friendship between lonely individuals. The series deals with accepting difference, seeing people without prejudice, and the importance of looking beyond the surface. The bittersweet, humorous books show life in all its guises. Even those of us with a rougher lot can experience joy and happiness.
The final book was published in a different format than the rest of the series, expanding into a short novel for middle-grade readers. In it, Dog and Cat say their farewells to Weasel.
Finlandia Junior Jury has stated: “An exceptionally beautifully written book about big, everlasting themes: grief, longing, love and friendship. Heavy as they may sound, the story helps to handle them with hope. It is deepened with warm illustrations of animal love and their point of view.”
The second book in the series, A Dog Called Cat Meets a Cat, was also nominated for Finlandia Junior Prize, in 2019.
Since 2010, at least one HLA author each year was nominated for Finlandia prize, and 8 of them ended up winning.
Winners in the category of the best novel include:
Mark your calendars: author Susanna Hast is travelling to Germany this November, to attending the Nordic Literary Days event in Hamburg 24-27.11, and will also be travelling to Kiel and Berlin during the trip.
Author Susanna Hast has a doctorate in Social Sciences. She works as a researcher and Associate Professor at Uniarts Helsinki. She has researched war, compassion and corporality.
Her intimately personal debut novel Body of Evidence (2022) touches on the mechanisms of violence and trauma, and in conjunction, the silent war against women, one that leaves no trace in the history books. The book is out in German with Nautilus
Her second novel, Hopelessness (2025), is a novel about maternal rejection from an adult daughter’s perspective. The work approaches the internal violence of intimate relationships, the necessity of separation and the horror of duality.
The Mythicals series by Miila Westin continues in France as Sarbacane secures the rights to Fading Light, the third and final volume in the series.
Fading Light (Sammuva valo, S&S 2025)
Wonderful news for the popular Mythicals series by Miila Westin: the series is set to continue in France as Sarbacane has secured the rights to Fading Light, the third and final volume in the trilogy.
The Mythicals series follows Eevi, a young girl who finds out that the creatures of Finnish mythology are real and affect the world we live in. In Endless Winter (Mythicals #1) Eevi and a newfound group of friends team up to bring back spring during an endless winter caused by the witch Louhi, and in A Dangerous Dream (Mythicals #2) they clash with Louhi again as she is after a necklace that belongs to Eevi’s family. The tension peaks and the stakes rise in Fading Light (Mythicals #3) when Eevi and her friends must stop Louhi as she plots to destroy the world as mankind knows it.
Author Miila Westin
Blending together mythology and reflections on climate change with colourful and atmospheric illustrations, the Mythicals series has been popular with readers and an international success, having already travelled to five foreign language territories.
Author and illustrator Miila Westin (b. 1987) has illustrated Radio Popov, the winner of The Finlandia Junior Prize (2020) sold to 26 foreign language territories. She graduated as Master of Arts in Visual Narrative from Aalto University of Arts and Design completing her thesis on the visualizations of Finnish mythical creatures. Her works are published in Finland by S&S.
Authors Linda Bondestam, Sanna Mander, and Sanna Pelliccioni have been nominated for the prestigious Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award.
The logo of the award, source: alma.se
Wonderful news: three of our talented authors and illustrators, Linda Bondestam, Sanna Mander, and Sanna Pelliccioni, have been nominated for this year’s prestigious Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award.
The Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award is awarded on a yearly basis to a person or organization for their contribution to children’s and YA literature. The award is administered by the Swedish Arts Council, in memory of world-famous Swedish author Astrid Lindgren. The winner will be announced in April 2026.
Linda Bondestam is one of the best-known Nordic illustrators. She has been a candidate for the Finlandia Junior and Astrid Lindgren Prizes as well as the Nordic Council’s Prize for Children’s and Young People’s Literature. HLA represents her The Fantastickle Friend, penned by Alexandra Salmela.
Sanna Pelliccioni is an established Finnish illustrator, who was awarded the Plaque Award at the Bratislava Biennale earlier this year for her illustrations of Sent Across The Sea. Sent Across the Sea is part of a trilogy by Eppu Nuotio & Sanna Pelliccioni presenting historical events through the eyes of children. The author duo’s latest work, Anteeksi (litt. “I’m sorry”, S&S 2025) was recently nominated for the Botnia award.
