Emma Puikkonen

Emma Puikkonen (b. 1974) is one of Finland’s foremost contemporary prose writers. Her works explore highly topical themes and phenomena, of which climate change has recently become the most important. She is a trained drama instructor who also teaches the literary arts and theatre.

Her work Eurooppalaiset unet (2016) was nominated for the Finlandia and Export Prizes, and an earlier novel, Lupaus (2019), met with critical acclaim. Her novel Musta peili (2021) (“The Black Mirror”, not published in English) was nominated for the Runeberg Prize and has been nominated for the 2023 Nordic Council Literature Prize.


The Black Mirror

Three women, three epochs and three destinies 

The Black Mirror is a magically beautiful novel about a world ran by oil.  And about the humankind who must take a look at the looking glass.

When Ida Tarbell is a child, black gold is springing from the ground  in her hometown of Rouseville in the 1860s. When Lotte Teer is a  child in 1973, people gather around on a picnic on an Amsterdam  highway. Astrid Fuglesang has always dreamed of oil rigs and lands  on one in the year 2028.

For millions of years, black liquid has hibernated beneath the earth and the ocean. When it is awoken, the humankind can no longer live without it. Ida, Lotte and Astrid are driven women whose fates are  swayed by oil. Each of them takes control of it, in a way.