About the Book
Vatanen, a journalist, is feeling burned out and sick of the city. One summer evening, he and a photographer set out on an assignment, and as they drive through the country, the car hits a young hare. Vatanen leaves the car to save the injured creature, and the grateful animal adopts him. This small incident becomes a turning point in Vatanen's life as he decides to break free from the world's constraints. He quits his job, leaves his wife, and sells his possessions to travel the Finnish wilds with his newfound friend. During their farcical adventures they encounter forest fires, pagan sacrifices, military war games, killer bears, political scandals, and much more.
About the Author :
Arto Paasilinna is a writer whose works have been at the top of the bestseller lists for twenty years. His books long remained unnoticed by Finland's chronically antagonistic literary critics, but thanks to his great popularity, many of them have reassessed their opinions. In France, his books have not only proven bestsellers but also critical triumphs.
Pico Iyer is the acclaimed and bestselling author of more than a dozen books, translated into twenty-three languages. His journalism has appeared in Time, the New York Times, New York Review of Books, the London Financial Times, and more than 250 other periodicals worldwide. His TED talks have been viewed over eleven million times. He divides his time between Japan and a Benedictine hermitage in California.
Herbert Lomas was educated at Liverpool University and has lectured in Finland and England. His publications include two collections of poetry, a paperback on possible social and economic change, and translations from Finnish poetry and prose.
Simon Vance, a former BBC Radio presenter and newsreader, is a full-time actor who has appeared on both stage and television. He has recorded over eight hundred audiobooks and has earned fifty-seven Earphones Awards from AudioFile magazine, including one for his narration of Scaramouche by Rafael Sabatini. A multiple Audie finalist, Simon has won Audie Awards for The King's Speech by Mark Logue and Peter Conradi, The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby by Charles Dickens, Great Expectations by Charles Dickens, Market Forces by Richard K. Morgan, and The Tao of Pooh by Benjamin Hoff. Winner of the 2008 Booklist Voice of Choice Award, Simon has also been named an AudioFile Golden Voice as well as an AudioFile Best Voice of 2009.
Review :
"I love The Year of the Hare...Which of us wouldn't secretly want to live in a novel as fresh and as full of events as this one?"
-- "Pico Iyer"
"Paasilinna's story is somehow plausible...and it feels as though we, too, could so easily desert our responsibilities to others to follow what fulfills us. The glory of the outdoors is celebrated here, through each season, and we can nearly smell the early clover and meadow vetchling of the hare's diet. Vatanen is who we want to be...No, scratch that--Vatanen is who we yearn to be brave enough to become, as soon as we stop waiting for the timing to be right."
-- "BookPage"
"Step out of the domestic gulag and into The Year of the Hare, a novel that depicts the confident freedom of the journeyman. I loved it."
-- "Matthew Crawford, bestselling author of Shop Class as Soulcraft"
"This picaresque novel could simply depict a middle-age crisis, but it reaches beyond fantasy or fiction, becoming mythic in its universal themes. The story is inventive, satirical, and quite humorous."
-- "Booklist"
"A fable of the joys of freedom...The hare proves to be a delightful, undemanding, and loyal companion, who can laugh, listen, and feel embarrassment."
-- "Boston Globe"
"Amazing...It can be read over a long winter afternoon and will leave you feeling a little warmer inside."
-- "San Francisco Book Review"
"Beguiling, gently ironic...[an] ode to spontaneity and serendipity."
-- "National Geographic Traveler"
"Compelling...You might just find yourself wishing for a hare to enter your life in the near future."
-- "Seattle Post-Intelligencer"
"Escapism at its best...Just pure fun--a fantasy of what might happen if one day you just said, 'Oh, the hell with it.'"
-- "Lynn Neary, NPR.org"
"Hilarious...With its fiercely independent protagonist and its depiction of Finland's wild northland, this comic novel will offer readers a rare opportunity to experience Finland and read one of that country's most popular authors."
-- "Library Journal"
"His protagonists...are like Vatanen, strong--some very strong--eccentric and often loners. He makes sardonic fun of Finnish bureaucrats, German tourists, the Finnish military and selfish young people."
-- "New York Times"
"Paasilinna has been amusing Finns for thirty years and readers in twenty-five languages."
-- "New York Times"
"Paasilinna's style is all Finn--a sly sense of humor, a simplicity, a moral compass that points firmly north and out of doors, away from cities...Readers root for Vatanen as he leaps off the mad merry-go-round."
-- "Los Angeles Times"
"When Mr. Paasilinna's novel appears in this country for the first time next month, it might just prove the perfect way into the actual Year of the Hare, which begins, according to many an Eastern calendar, in January."
-- "Wall Street Journal"
