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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To all you Moomins fans...

36 replies

LittleWingSoul · 07/12/2016 22:44

Aibu to ask which of the Moomins books are actual paperback books/novels with mainly text (like 80/90%) and not just picture books for infants?

My DD8 loved 'Moominpapa at sea' and one about a comet but I am struggling to find more of the same online and accidentally ordered a picture book!

Trying to avoid shops (other than supermarket where absolutely necessary) pre-Christmas as I find it all bit Arghhh!

OP posts:
blueistheonlycolourwefeel · 07/12/2016 22:51

I had The Finn Family Moomin troll and loved it.

littlesallyracket · 07/12/2016 22:56

I love all things Moomin.

The ones you want are the paperbacks published by Puffin. This one is 'Finn Family Moomintroll' but if you look at the 'Customers also bought' bit at the bottom you'll see loads of others, all with the same style of cover (including the comet one you mentioned):

www.amazon.co.uk/Finn-Family-Moomintroll-Puffin-Books/dp/014030150X/ref=sr_1_9?ie=UTF8&qid=1481151159&sr=8-9&keywords=tove+jansson+moomin

I'm glad your DD loves them; they're such lovely, thoughtful, unpatronising books. Magical.

StStrattersOfMN · 07/12/2016 23:01

I loved Comet in Moominland best. There's also Finn Family Moomintroll, Moominsummer Madness, Moominland Midwinter, and Tales From Moominvalley.

StStrattersOfMN · 07/12/2016 23:03

Forgot Moominvalley in November.

Massive Moomin fan. Adore them. Bitterly disappointed by Moomins on the Riviera :(

TinklyLittleLaugh · 07/12/2016 23:03

Finn Family Moomintroll is the best book ever. Moominmamma is the parent I aspire to be.

Original poster
LittleWingSoul · 07/12/2016 23:03

Yeah she loves reading and I was surprised and pleased she liked the 2 books she mentioned, they were a birthday gift from her great aunt and I loved that they are quite innocent and clearly timeless! She has exhausted Jacqueline Wilson (which have some themes in them I'm not sure she is mature enough for) and the Moomins seem like the perfect antidote.

Thanks for your suggestions blue and little Smile

OP posts:
Original poster
LittleWingSoul · 07/12/2016 23:05

Thanks everyone!

OP posts:
TinklyLittleLaugh · 07/12/2016 23:05

Yes they are innocent without being at all bland. The characters are really well drawn, flaws and all.

OhSoggyBiscuit · 07/12/2016 23:30

I like the one where Moominpapa writes his memoirs- can't remember what it was called but I loved it as a kid.

glueandstick · 07/12/2016 23:33

Moomin makes me feel all calm and happy.

Love Comet in Moominland.

So glad they are still popular! Tove Jansson also wrote adult books - def worth reading.

DameDiazepamTheDramaQueen · 07/12/2016 23:34

There's a moomin shop in covent garden!

rumbelina · 07/12/2016 23:34

Not a novel but not a book with pictures for infants...

The book of Moomin, Mymble and Little My is a great great book. It's an adventure poem with great pictures.

DameDiazepamTheDramaQueen · 07/12/2016 23:35

Sorry, you're trying to avoid shops.

PhilODox · 07/12/2016 23:35

ohsoggy Exploits of MoominPappa?

My favourite is Finn Family Moomintroll. I love the Hobgoblin's hat, Bingumy and Thob, the ~RUBIES~, the Groke especially... the Marmeluke, the Hattifatteners.

Oh, I love the Hattifatteners actually.
And the Hemulen pinching the barometer.

[sigh]

Original poster
LittleWingSoul · 07/12/2016 23:36

Just ordered a few of your suggestions on amazon - thanks folks! Santa is also bringing DD the Sweeney Todd soundtrack and some lego people... her stocking is going to be a right old mixed bag!

OP posts:
StStrattersOfMN · 07/12/2016 23:44

I love the Hattifatteners too 😊

littlesallyracket · 08/12/2016 00:00

Yes they are innocent without being at all bland. The characters are really well drawn, flaws and all.

Yes, that's exactly it - they're gentle stories, but at the time they're not afraid to be sad or wistful and really quite philosophical sometimes and they can even be a little unsettling in a way that's still 'safe', if you know what I mean. Just lovely. And you're so right about the characters having flaws, and yet they still love each other anyway, flaws and all.

I think I might actually like to be a Moomin when I grow up.

MadameMaxGoesler · 08/12/2016 00:07

I adore the Moomins. Apart from the Good Housekeeping Cookbook, the Puffin Moomin books were the only library overlap with my husband. We've been married for 26 years. He cooks.

illegitimateMortificadospawn · 08/12/2016 00:10

We bought a lovely hardback one once in Mr B's bookshop on a daytrip to Bath. Is there one about a flood? DS2 found the dark illustrations in the swamp (eyes peering out of the shadows) terrifying when he was younger, which limited scope for bedtime reading, but it is lovely, lovely book.

I like Tove Jansson's adult novels. I read 'The Summer Book' to my children (7 and 10) and they loved it. It is set on a Finnish family's summer island, where they have a summer cottage and focusses on a young girl and her elderly sculptress grandmother, crossing several consecutive summer's adventures and scrapes. The grandmother actively encourages risk taking and artistic endeavours. It's lovely, but also a bit sad and wistful.

StStrattersOfMN · 08/12/2016 00:13

There's a flood in Moominsummer Madness; they all float away in a theatre, and put on a play.

I don't like Sniff, bastard little whiny arse.

TinklyLittleLaugh · 08/12/2016 00:14

The bit in Finn Family Moomintroll where Moomintroll has been changed by the Hobgoblin's hat. And none of his mates recognise him and are all being mean to him. And he is sad and scared. And Moominmamma looks into his eyes and says "I will always recognise you my little Moomin." Oh God I'm welling up now.

Still think Moominpapa is a cocklodger though.

AmyGDalae · 08/12/2016 00:19

Sorry you found Jacqueline Wilson books to have mature themes which were a bit much for your dd atm, but are gifting her Sweeney Todd?

You do realise the storyline of Sweeney Todd is a man who is banished so another man can rape his wife who promptly attempts to kill herself and ends up permanently mentally unwell. He then locks their daughter in a room and raises her as his daughter until she comes of age and he attempts to force her to marry him. Said girl escapes with her stalker who has been watching her obsessively through the window in desperation. Banished guy eventually escapes and returns to London where he begins to seek revenge and while waiting for the opportunity to kill the man who he thinks killed his wife (not realising she is wandering the streets confused) kills lots of innocent people who a woman who is obsessed with him bakes into pies which they feed to the people of London....

TinklyLittleLaugh · 08/12/2016 00:21

Poor Sniff. He is such a peevish little person. I think Snuffkin was my first crush.

Loads of the character have issues though. Hemeulens are definitely on the spectrum and Fillyjonks are OCD.

PhilODox · 08/12/2016 00:26

Shock Tinkly! But Moominpappa bought the Moominhouse with proceeds of his earlier exploits, no?

I don't like Sniff either, he's so whiny.

I have always adored Snuffkin. I think he's my alter ego really.

StStrattersOfMN · 08/12/2016 00:27

I love the word 'peevish'. 😃

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