True

Riikka Pulkkinen

Original title: Totta

Author: Riikka Pulkkinen

Published: 2010

Publisher: Otava

Genre: Literary Fiction

Pages: 333

An addressing novel about the deceptiveness of memory, the mercy of a lie, and love

Elsa is dying. Her husband Martti and daughter Eleonoora are struggling to accept the crushing thought that they are soon to lose her. As Elsa becomes ever more fragile, Eleonoora’s childhood memories are slipping away.

Meanwhile, Eleonoora’s daughter Anna spends her time pondering the fates of passersby. For her, the world is full of stories. But the story that will change her forever is the one about Eeva, her mother’s nanny, whom her grandparents have been silent about for years.

Eeva’s forgotten story, which Anna first learns of when she discovers an old dress of Eeva’s, is finally revealed layer by layer. The tale that unfolds is about a mother and daughter, about how memory can deceive us – and sometimes that is the most merciful thing that can happen.

A beautiful, sensuous novel.

– Library Journal

Download reading materials

Rights sold:
FINLAND: Otava (orig.)

About author

Riikka Pulkkinen

Riikka Pulkkinen (b. 1980) is one of the top names in Finnish literature. Her debut novel The Limit (2006) gained wide attention, was a bestseller, and was adapted into a play and a TV series in Finland. Her international breakthrough came with her second novel, True (2010), which was the one novel everyone was talking about that year at the Frankfurt book fair. The novel has been published in 17 countries to date.

Pulkkinen’s novels are characterized by the precision with which she describes the psychology of the characters, and the philosophical themes that reflect from the characters into the refined structure of the novels and culminate on the level of the plot. The main questions she explores in her novels concern power, responsibility, and justice.

Pulkkinen has an M.A. in Literary Studies from the University of Helsinki, and she lives in Helsinki with her husband and her two children. She enjoys dancing and running in the forest or by the seaside. If she weren’t a writer, she would be a psychologist or a baker.

For her works, Riikka Pulkkinen has received the Kaarle award in 2007, the Laila Hirvisaari Fund stipend in 2007, the Veijo Meri Award in 2019, and her novel True was nominated for the Finlandia Prize in 2010. Her acclaimed novel Enchantment (Otava, 2022) will be published in English by Scribe in 2026, and her new novel Our Last Game (Otava, 2024) published in Finland in August 2024 is gaining starred reviews.

Bibliography


2024, Literary Fiction

Riikka Pulkkinen

Our Last Game


2022, Literary Fiction

Riikka Pulkkinen

The Enchantment


2010, Literary Fiction

Riikka Pulkkinen

True


2006, Literary Fiction

Riikka Pulkkinen

The Limit