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"There is, in short, everything in the Moon books: giant comets and secret caves and tree houses and stilts and magic-carpet clouds and amusement parks run by despotic practical-joking kings and time machines and ski instructors." -"Harper's
""We need Moominland for its gentle pace, its sense of beauty and awe, and its spirit of friendliness and empathy--now more than ever." -"The Horn Book
""These charming fantasies are propelled by a childlike curiosity and filled with quiet wisdom, appealing geniality, and a satisfying sense of self-discovery." -School Library Journal.com
"If you had no shame reading "Harry Potter" on the subway, there's no need to hide Tove Jansson's witty, whimsically illustrated Finnish series." -Daily Candy
"The Moomin books make for both splendid bedtime read-alouds and solitary savoring." -"Wall Street Journal" "It's more than forty years since Jansson's Moomintrolls first appeared. I found the writing and invention as appealing
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At the centre of the story stands Moominpappa. He is overcome with boredom and restlessness, but doesn't know what to do about it. Finally, he moves his family out to a deserted, unwelcoming island with an unwelcoming lighthouse. Adopting the role of lighthouse keeper, Moominpappa tries to engage himself in his new life. Moominmamma silently dislikes her new home and dreams her way back to Moominvalley in her own way; Moomin becomes obsessed with the beautiful but vain sea horses that appear on the beach at moonlight; the irresponsible Little My watches everything as if from afar, seemingly unaffected by the whole thing, and finally the eerie Groke follows the family to the island, unbeknownst to most of them. The book is subtly divided between Moominpappa, Moominmamma and Moomin. Their new life on the island begins to do something to them, and they slowly drift apart and become absorbed in their own dreams and worries.
Nothing goes right; Moominpappa humiliatingly doesn't know how to light the lighthouse, so he tries new and new ways to be useful but faces nothing but failures, making him increasingly frustrated. The tiniest ray of hope makes him excited, ecstatic, even if the reader can tell that there may not be much basis for his excitement. His growing anger finally lashes out at the sea, which he identifies as the root of all his problems. Tove Jansson always had an extraordinary gift at making her characters face very human dilemmas. I find it hard to witness just how lost they all are, especially Moominpappa. And yet there is a very real hope running throughout, and just like with life, the resolve comes when you least expect it. The family learn a lot and they reach all the right conclusions via all the wrong means. All this is masterfully presented by Tove Jansson, able to go from stark real to dreamlike fantasy near-effortlessly. The clear and unsentimental way in which the story is told clinches it.
Moominpappa at Sea is an almost psychological landscape; a deep and thoughtful reflection on what it means to grow up and find peace within yourself. I recommend it when you feel like reflecting on your life.
It's not an especially happy book, however. You could even go so far as to describe it as a journey inside depression. This might come as a slight shock to readers of previous Finn Family Moomintroll books, since they are so suffused with a happy-go-lucky sense of life as an extraordinary adventure full of unexpected twists and turns.
Nonetheless, in this novel (the last of all the Moomin books), life for the Moomin family takes a turn for the worse. Moominpappa - ever an eccentric and wayward chap - autocratically decides to relocate his entire family to a lighthouse on a remote island. But the island turns out to be an extremely lonely place, and as a result, the Moomin family slowly drifts apart in strange ways.
It is a rare book - be it marketed at adults or children - which is able to convey so intangible a concept as depression without simplifying it. 'Moominpappa at sea', with its beautiful and haunting sense of place, is a novel about just that - being at sea. Yet Tove Jansson, with her imaginative and poetic grasp of emotional experience, somehow pulls it off.
This is ultimately what makes it an uplifting read rather than a sad one. For although the Moomin family don't have the best of times on their island, their sense of themselves is strengthened and reaffirmed. This powerful little novel similarly offers us the chance to appreciate how weird and wonderful our lives can be, whether they are happy ones or not.
Everyone should know about the moomins.
This is my favourite of the moomin series.
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