The Secret Ones

Tuutikki Tolonen

Original title: Salaiset

Author: Tuutikki Tolonen

Illustrator: Anne Vasko

Published: 2024

Publisher: FINLAND: WSOY (orig.)

Genre: Picture Books (0-3 Years)

Pages: 40

Reading material:

English pdf in March 2024

Unleash your creativity and discover the creatures who live right next to you in secret! This delightful picture book invites young readers to look at ordinary homes with new eyes.

✓ Encourages imaginary play & playful interactions between parents and children

✓ Tuutikki Tolonen is an Arvid Lydecken award-winning author whose Monster Nanny series has been sold into 37 territories!

✓ Anne Vasko is the recipient of the Rudolf Koivu illustration award 2010 and has been nominated for the Finlandia Junior 2010 and for the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award (2017 & 2021). Her books have been sold to over 20 languages.

This charming picture book invites its readers to play a game: could there be secret creatures, living side by side with humans in ordinary homes? They leave signs to those who know where and how to look.

Why are there crumbs on the kitchen floor? Perhaps you have a crumbscraper living with you! The creature itself is so shy, you can rarely see it. How about the holes in your socks; did you know they might be the result of a lintbug? And when the remote control is lost again, maybe the amnesianos have stolen it.

About author

Tuutikki Tolonen

Tuutikki Tolonen is the author of several acclaimed children’s books, plays and academic articles. She teaches creative writing and has worked as an editor and reporter at Vinski, a Finnish literary magazine for children. For Monster Nanny she received the Arvid Lydecken award.  Her inspiration for the Monster Nanny trilogy sparked during a family breakfast. “My son Leo, then six, said: ‘I heard on the radio yesterday that all moms have to go on vacation and monsters will take their places,” she says.

Her other bestselling series is the Agnes-series, of which the first book "Agnes and the Garden of Dreams" was in 2021 nominated for the Arvid Lydecken Award, received an honorable mention for the Runeberg Junior Award, and won the Luku Varkaus Award. Tolonen tells that the inspiration for Agnes comes for her interest for weird and inexpicable tales, ghost stories and mysteries: "I wanted to write a book my daughter Aili, then nine, would like to read - not too long, not too scary, but very curious."

Bibliography


2024, Picture Books (0-3 Years)

Tuutikki Tolonen

The Secret Ones


2022, Middle Grade (8-12 Years)

Tuutikki Tolonen

Agnes and the Shadow in the Window


2021, Middle Grade (8-12 Years)

Tuutikki Tolonen

Agnes and the Mysterious Manor


2020, Middle Grade (8-12 Years)

Tuutikki Tolonen

Monster Message


2020, Middle Grade (8-12 Years)

Tuutikki Tolonen

Agnes and the Garden of Dreams


2016, Middle Grade (8-12 Years)

Tuutikki Tolonen

Monster Route


2015, Middle Grade (8-12 Years)

Tuutikki Tolonen

Monster Nanny