The Summer Book in Reading with Style

Jul 11, 2021 Steph rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: first-read-in-2021, lgbtiap-kinda, ebook-kindle, lost-in-translation, place-europe, summertime-sadness

such a sweet summer read!! i'm reminded of jacob have i loved and when marnie was there: slow, old-fashioned seaside stories where the salt-air setting is as prominent as any of the characters.

each chapter is its own little vignette, following sophia and her grandmother during a slow summer on a small island. i loved the interactions between sophia and grandmother. they're both so spirited, so matter-of-fact, and their banter feels very real. they play together, have deep conversations together, such a sweet summer read!! i'm reminded of jacob have i loved and when marnie was there: slow, old-fashioned seaside stories where the salt-air setting is as prominent as any of the characters.

each chapter is its own little vignette, following sophia and her grandmother during a slow summer on a small island. i loved the interactions between sophia and grandmother. they're both so spirited, so matter-of-fact, and their banter feels very real. they play together, have deep conversations together, irritate each other, and take care of one another.

some of my favorite chapters:

"the magic forest," about a dead forest on the edge of the island, filled with branches of collapsed trees and marshy spots. grandmother whittles "outlandish animals" into old pieces of wood and adorns the forest with their odd personalities.

"playing venice," another section where grandmother's creativity brings a part of the island to life. she carves miniature buildings out of small pieces of wood, and together she and sophia build a little venice on the edge of a marsh pool. when it rains and their city is submerged, sophia is horrified by the loss of the imagined residents, so grandmother hastily builds a new palace for her. such quiet tenderness.

"the cat," wherein sophia falls hopelessly in love with an antisocial cat named moppy and tries desperately to win his affection.

"It's funny about love," Sophia said. "The more you love someone, the less he likes you back."

"That's very true," Grandmother observed. "And so what do you do?"

"You go on loving," said Sophia threateningly. "You love harder and harder."

moppy is traded for an affectionate cat named fluff, but sophia isn't satisfied with fluff, either. she misses moppy terribly, and they trade cats again.

"the tent," which i actually read while camping in a tent myself! sophia camps out on her own, and during the night she gets scared and goes back to the house to talk to grandmother. meanwhile, grandmother is sadly reflecting on her own fading childhood camping memories. sophia tells grandmother about how it feels to sleep in a tent, then goes back to sleep outside. they both drift off to sleep feeling better, which is lovely.

"of angleworms and others," in which sophia, suddenly plagued with a terrible fear of small animals, decides to write a book about worms and other "pitiful creatures." she dictates the book to grandmother, making perceptive and empathetic observations about worms, and about the pain they feel when they are split in half. i loved the subtle wisdom in this chapter.

"day of danger," wherein grandmother teaches sophia about superstitions, and sophia immediately becomes extremely superstitious. she is convinced they have to find a cure to prevent her father from falling to misfortune, so sophia and grandmother take a moonlit walk, picking up pebbles, beach grass, and other little things that grandmother says will avert death. very dreamy and atmospheric.

short and sweet and subtly tender, i loved devouring this book over the course of a few days in the woods. i love that it's about their intergenerational friendship and life on the island, but in a quiet way it's also about solitude, death, and accepting change. definitely recommended as a soft and refreshing summer read!! ...more

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Jul 12, 2013 Connie G rated it really liked it

Shelves: 1001-books, family, short-stories, translated, europe, around-world-80-books-group-read, finland

A young girl, Sophia, and her grandmother spent a summer on a small island in the Gulf of Finland with Sophia's father. They shared a love of nature, and a deep affection for each other. Told in twenty-two vignettes, their conversations were wise, witty, and observant. It was a summer of discovery and of noticing the little things that make the world beautiful or scary--the sea birds, the soft moss, the gnarled branches, the power of the winds, and the battering waves of a storm.

"Sophia woke up A young girl, Sophia, and her grandmother spent a summer on a small island in the Gulf of Finland with Sophia's father. They shared a love of nature, and a deep affection for each other. Told in twenty-two vignettes, their conversations were wise, witty, and observant. It was a summer of discovery and of noticing the little things that make the world beautiful or scary--the sea birds, the soft moss, the gnarled branches, the power of the winds, and the battering waves of a storm.

"Sophia woke up and remembered that they had come back to the island and that she had a bed to herself because her mother was dead." Although there were no other mentions of her mother, it is obvious that death is simmering in the background throughout the book. Sophia asked about birds that die on the rocks, moths that fly into flames, and angleworms that are cut in half and regenerate.

Sophia was a little girl filled with questions about the world, a person near the start of her life. The grandmother was having physical problems as she aged. But the grandmother collected old wood and still saw the world through an artist's eyes. "Grandmother sat in the magic forest and carved outlandish animals...They retained their wooden souls, and the curve of their backs and legs had the enigmatic shape of growth itself and remained a part of the decaying forest."

The character of the wise, artistic grandmother was based on Jansson's own mother who died the year before the book was written. Sophia was modeled on Jansson's cousin. The author spent many summers on a similiar island. Jansson was a novelist, painter, illustrator, and comic strip artist. She was also the author of the Moomin books for children. Although she was a citizen of Finland, she was part of the Swedish-speaking minority and wrote her books in Swedish.

Jansson captured that special feeling of living close to the ocean. It brought back memories of vacations along the shores of New England. One never knows what will be swept up by the next wave, or blown in by the next breeze. ...more

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