"Comet in Moominland" (book review)

by Tove Jansson, 1946.

1946??
Yep, 1946 in Finland, is when and where this book springs from - and from the fertile imagination of Ms Tove Jansson, who is no longer with us.
She wrote several books about the Moomins, a very sweet type of creature with a curvy hippo-like snout and a pot-belly, and all the Moomins' friends and...er...acquaintances.

I was introduced to the Moomins by my sister, Joke - who came across them as a member of the Scandinavian society at Ak university (I also met Pippi Longstocking through this association) - and fell in love with them straight away back in the 70s.

Why?

Direct writing, almost naive, filled with humour and a wonderful observation of human character through fictional/fantastical beings.

Or maybe that's why I like them NOW - back then it was probably more the all-enveloping magical world of the Moomins that appealed.

The books are, then, for children "of all ages" - easy to read, easy to love, sometimes difficult to rationalise!

Oh, and it's about a comet speeding towards Earth.

Here's a quote:

"Moomintroll thought how frightened the Earth must be feeling with that great ball of fire coming nearer and nearer to her. Then he thought about how much he loved everything; the forest and the sea, the rain and the wind, the sunshine, the grass and the moss, and how impossible it would be to live without them all, and this made him feel very, very sad. But after a while he stopped worrying.

"Mamma will know what to do", he said to himself.

9/10.