Czech rights sold for 36 URNS: A HISTORY OF BEING WRONG by Sirpa Kähkönen!

A future classic, Finlandia Prize winner and bestselling novel 36 URNS: A History of Being Wrong by multiple award-winning author Sirpa Kähkönen will be published by HOST, one of the largest publishing houses in the Czech Republic. The deal was closed by Elina Ahlbäck at Elina Ahlback Literary Agency Agency in co-operation with our wonderful co-agent Antonija Radić at Corto Literary.

Here’s what Lucie Bregantová, translated fiction editor in Host, Czechia, had to say about Kähkönen:

“Reading Sirpa Kähkönen 36 Urns is a true literary feast. The balance between introspective ruminations and narrative parts is very delicate and gives the text an immense emotional impact. The book is about silence, pain and trauma but also about understanding and love, showing hope in places than at first sight seem impenetrably dark. Host publishing is extremely proud to have the honour to introduce Sirpa Kähkönen to Czech readers, accompanied by other exquisite writers like Annie Ernaux, Tove Ditlevsen or Pirkko Saisio.”

Rights are still available in the UK and US, Poland, Italy, Denmark, France…

DOWNLOAD ALL MATERIALS HERE

About 36 URNS:

Author Sirpa Kähkönen’s mother Riitta (b. 1941) died in March 2022 after a long illness. In life, she struggled to accept love. “I do not grieve your death, I grieve your life,” Sirpa Kähkönen writes, knowing fully well that her mother wouldn’t like the phrase. Her mother rejected love, despite longing for it the most. Riitta was athletic, beautiful, and gifted. A traffic accident at the age of 16 changed the course of her life for ever.

Drawing on her mother’s diaries, Kähkönen depicts the life of a 1950s girl and the dramatic change that followed the accident. The novel talks about community dance halls, a broken mind, flowing hems, a 1960s mother, anxiety, anger and hate, addiction, and moments of psychosis. It talks about how wars and other crises become corporeal, how violence is inherited, and how the culture of discouragement and submission is passed down through the generations in sayings and attitudes, with the author clearly seeing herself as part of the tradition of anger and violence.

The novel is permeated by a fiery love, as if an ancient Finnish spell that, with the power of words, is capable of bringing loved ones back from the dead.

“The book is a skillful literature work, perceptive and insightful. Confession-like. The prose is clear and precise. [—] The personal experience of the author grows into a universal reach, and she finds something globally applicable about humans, hate, anger, lies, hope, dreams and their crumbling, death. This brings forth a masterpiece, which is worth living for. ”
– Jorma Uotinen, Finlandia Literature Prize Grand Juror