ANATOMY OF A STORM
by Sinikka Vuola
Myrskyn anatomia, WSOY 2024, 152pp
An ambitious and experimental novel by an acclaimed author.
‘i waited for mother to come, she would come very soon; later i waited in parks and cafés and at metro stations: mother could after all appear anywhere and any moment i was afraid of not being at the right place at the right time; and the wind inside me turned every time i thought of the meeting when i saw mothers with their small children, my heart was so heavy that it couldn’t say a word: their proximity was perfect, incomprehensible’
The protagonist of this mosaic novel is an anonymous woman on the verge of adulthood who lives with her father and twin sister in an unnamed city. She is haunted by confusion about her origins.
She receives no support from her father, who is struggling with his own loss. Meanwhile, her mother is only a “vague ancient word”. But the siblings manage to make a peculiar friend, a young man who brightens their days.
Anatomy of a Storm is a rich, timeless, ambiguous work about an emptiness that cannot be filled and the wind that blows where it will.
RIGHTS SOLD: Finland WSOY (orig.)
Materials available: English sample, Full Finnish pdf
Praise:
“Anatomy of a Storm [...] deals with the themes of growing up, love and eternal change in an understandable, concise and profound way. In a way it echoes the classics of world literature, starting with Ovid’s Metamorphoses .”
“The end of The Anatomy of a Storm is stunning. It’s a beautifully written emotional state that lingers in the mind. It is dark, eternal and yet hopeful. Absolutely stunning! […] This novel that can be read many times and in many ways. […] And if I were in the Finlandia Prize jury this year, The Anatomy of a Storm would be on my shortlist. It’s definitely an outstanding work of fiction! ”
“The work successfully blurs the boundaries not only between poetry, prose and fragmentary literature, but also between literature that portrays young people’s experiences and literature that is artistically ambitious. ”
Sinikka Vuola is a Helsinki-based writer and philosophy graduate. Her debut work, the poetry collection The Orchestra we Can’t Hear (Tammi 2007) was nominated for the Helsingin Sanomat Literature Prize and awarded the Kalevi Jäntti Prize. Vuola’s third collection of poems, The World’s Hardest Language (Tammi 2013), was nominated for the Finnish Broadcasting Company YLE’s Tanssiva Karhu Prize.
Vuola's debut novel Replica (Tammi 2016) was nominated for the Runeberg Prize. Along with Laura Lindstedt, Vuola wrote the methodical murder mystery 101 Ways to Kill a Husband (Siltala 2022), which was nominated for the Nordic Council Literature Prize in 2022.
Author portrait by Aleksi Poutanen.
