Carmen and the Summer Cottage: Two Weeks by a Finnish Lak

Every Finnish summer ends up at a cottage, and this year the cottage has a snake in it.

Veikko packs twelve heat packs for fourteen days, because one heat pack is a single point of failure, and one bag for himself. Carmen travels in a box with the lamp on the seat beside her, watching the trees run. Nappi discovers that he is also cargo.

Then two weeks by a lake. Water that moves, which the cat will not forgive. Mosquitoes that he hunts with real professional pride, eleven in one evening, counted aloud. Blueberries until Aino's hands are purple. A neighbour who once killed a cactus and will therefore never be trusted with anything living. An evening when Veikko takes the boat out at six, the birds stop, the wind turns, and three animals watch an empty lake through a cottage window until twenty past seven.

And, after a year of asking, forty-five seconds in the doorway of a sauna. She says it was worth it. She is lying, and she knows exactly why she is lying.

Ten chapters of comic strips and six full Sunday pages about a family holiday the snake did not ask for and quietly enjoys.

70 full-colour pages. DRM-free PDF and EPUB included. Read on any device.