Whispers in Lace

A tender two-timeline novel that contrasts the lives of strong women navigating love and challenges in a small North Karelian town, with the historical narrative taking readers back to 1939, when war transforms lives and sets the stage for a story filled with fragility and hope

Two women of their own ways, same fragile dream

Mari Renko’s Whispers in Lace is a poignant novel that takes place in two different times and takes the readers to the familiar yellow wooden house on the shore of lake Pielinen, to the Ikonen family.

To everyone’s surprise, Kaarlo Ikonen, the prodigal son, has returned to Nurmes and signed up as a doctor at the local clinic. It quickly turns out that the bachelor has no plans to settle down. Kaarlo’s best friend Saana Lahtinen, who has lived next door to Kaarlo since they were children, has instead decided to turn a new page in her life and become a single mother. The fickle and inconstant doctor Ikonen suddenly feels that he is losing his friend. How will their relationship fare when Saana ends up asking the capricious Kaarlo for help?

In 1939, a nurse named Elsi, working in the Nurmes military hospital, finds out she is pregnant, and alone. A friend encourages her to get rid of her lovechild, but this is something Elsi is unable to do. Is she really left with only one option: finding a husband before anyone finds out her secret? As bombs rain down from the skies, Elsi whispers her frailest wish into a lace veil and squeezes it in the palm of her hand.

Whispers in Lace is an emotional story about women unto whose path time casts its shadow and dreams that, despite everything, pulse deep in one’s heart and make one question whether all is truly fair in love and war.