Kerttu K. has two hands and ten fingers, and a the tip of each finger is a long nail.
Author: Pauliina Vanhatalo
Illustrator: Anna Emilia Laitinen
Finnish original: Nipistäjä-Kerttu
Publisher: S&S, 2019
Genre: illustrated children’s fiction
Number of pages: 46 pp.
Reading material: Finnish original, English translation
Kerttu thinks her family is mostly completely boring: her mother, her father, and her brother too. No one listens to her, understands her or pays her enough attention. But Kerttu has her methods: when she isn’t noticed, she pinches people! In the end the rest of the family has had enough, and Kerttu loses her lovely long nails. She is very cross – but luckily her mum understands the reason.
Pauliina Vanhatalo’s first children’s book bears the message that we all have our own inner worlds, which need space and which make us unique. Anna Emilia Laitinen’s water-colour illustrations are tender and charming.
“There’s something I should have told you,” Mum says, wiping the tears from Kerttu’s cheek. It sounds like a secret. And maybe it is, a bit, for Mum tells her that there is another world inside everyone. It is a world of imagination, thinking, planning, dreaming and play. Memories are kept there. That’s where you look for answers to questions. And it’s where dreams come from.”
About the author:
Pauliina Vanhatalo