New Swedish Books, Spring 2020 1
41 Spring 2020 Fjodor Puts His Head Underwater Fj
ordor is a small boy with glasses who is a little lonely but not particularly depressed on account of it. He handles reality with great caution, but still manages to end up in the most dangerous situations. In these six cartoon-based short stories, we get to follow the young anti-hero’s complicated struggle with existence. When he takes his pet hamster to the class party, it begins to tickle him so much that his shuffling is misinterpreted as a break dance and he subsequently wins the dance contest of the evening. When he goes for a sleepover with a friend, he manages to end up with a sheet on top of him in the middle of the night, scaring the living daylights out of his friend and her entire family, who think he is a ghost. And one day in the school gymnasium, he manages to break a water pipe – thus transforming the hall into a giant indoor swimming pool. Although the depiction of Fjodor in the embarrassing situations of childhood recalls the style of Diary of a Wimpy Kid, the subtle brutality of the slapstick humour is perhaps more reminiscent of Jacques Tati’s Monsieur Hulot, or Buster Keaton’s risky bravado. These stories about Fjodor are a standalone continuation of the cartoon-based collection of short stories Fjodor hux flux, which were first published in 2017. Pelle Forshed Works Under tiden, children’s comics, 2018 De anhöriga, comics/short stories, 2012 The Monsterson Family-series, children’s fiction, 14 titles, 2013-2018 Childrens’s comics, 6-9 years, 96 p Pelle Forshed (b. 1974) Publisher Rabén & Sjögren www.rabensjogren.se Rights Rabén & Sjögren Agency Åsa Bergman asa.bergman@rabensjogren.se Photo: Göran Segeholm