Kalle Päätalo: Before the Storm (novel)

Kalle Päätalo: Finnish novelist 11.11.1919 - 20.11.2000
Before the Storm: novel, published in 1962

Second book in Päätalo's 'Koillismaa'-series.

More of the same commonplace realistic shit. Well, someone might say that, but I don't. The characters in this book are so sympathetic and down to earth that you would have to be a real son of a bitch not to like them. And if the reader likes the characters, then he probably is also interested in reading about what happens to them - Kauko, Kosti, Nestori and IIvari, the heroes and villains of this story.

Kauko gets a job in log hauling and road building. He is still underage, but this is overlooked and he works like crazy to get money for his mother and siblings. Getting a job is the biggest blessing he can hope for. At the end of log hauling period he gets his first big salary, dreams about what he is going to buy for his family and then what he does? He goes and looses it all in a card game! This is almost too much to bear, even for the reader. "Don't do it, man, don't do it!" I caught myself shouting in my thoughts.

Kosti, the stranger who came to the village in the first pages of the series, gets promoted in road construction projects and marries Iivari's (village's main man and also some kind of crook of the story) daughter. Father is not at all pleased at this and they drift into conflict. Iivari's and Kosti's backgrounds are somewhat revealed. These are the weakest points of the book in my opinion. Immediately as the the author uses any literary tricks. as simple as flashback, his voice looses a small bit of credebility. I don't know why that is, and maybe it's just me, but that's how I felt.

Two young men in village, son of IIvari and son of Nestori head to seek better life outside the village. Other as policeman in Vyborg near russian... excuse me...I mean Soviet Union...border and other as a refugee to Soviet Union (where no man has to suffer from poverty). Both attempts lead to disappointment somehow, and they return with long faces to their childhood homes.

Once again the use of dialect, local phrases and proverbs is overwhelming. You can find a new one in every page. This guy really loved words and probably picked up and memorised every proverb he ever heard in his life. Don't know how well all these translate into english though, I myself read these novels in original language.

The part ends in late 1930's, at the dawn of exciting historical events: second world war and winter war in Finland. See what the the author can pull out of it in the third part. This second one was once again guaranteed quality of traditional storytelling about ordinary people in Finnish backwoods.

Blocker's Verdict: 3/5

Word of the day: dialect = A variety of a language (specifically, often a spoken variety) that is characteristic of a particular area, community or group, often with relatively minor differences in vocabulary, style, spelling and pronunciation.