Amazing news about our wonderful children’s titles!
Monster Nanny celebrates its 25th foreign sale as Turbine bought the Danish rights to this adorable middle-grade series with a Hollywood feature film being developed.
”Crazy fun to read with kids… very, very beautifully made… The illustrations are perfect because they create a second layer to the story, which is what illustrations are supposed to do. They tell their own story and visualize Grah, Hilla, Kaapo and Maikki perfectly.” – Ines Dettmann, Deutschlandfunk
Riikka Jäntti’s Little Mouse travels far far away as Kathalaya acquired the Nepalese rights to the first 3 books of the series! Kathalaya’s mission is to bring foreign stories to the Nepalese readers while increasing the literacy rate and the culture of reading.
Get ready for the Monster Tournament! Pasi Pitkänen is one of the Finland’s most sought-after illustrators, and in his second solo-project he has created a colorful action-packed picture book. The first foreign sales to The Monster Tournament was to Egypt, where Ink Publishing acquired the World Arabic rights.
Rights sold (Monster Nanny):
Original publisher: FINLAND, Tammi
BOSNIA, Šahinpašić
BRAZIL, DarkSide Books
CHINA, Beijing Children’s Publishing House
CZECH REPUBLIC, Portál
DENMARK, Turbine
ESTONIA, Tiritamm
FRANCE, Editions Robert Laffont
GERMANY, Carl Hanser Verlag
HUNGARY, Tessloff Babilon
ITALY, Salani/Mauri Spagnol
LATVIA, Zvaigzne
NETHERLANDS, Luitingh-Sijthoff
NORWAY, Gyldendal Norsk
POLAND, Vesper
PORTUGAL, Asa Editiones/Leya
ROMANIA, Editura Univers
RUSSIA, Rosman
SLOVENIA, Mladinska knjiga
SPAIN (Spanish), La Galera
SPAIN (Catalan), La Galera
SWEDEN, Rabén & Sjögren
TURKEY, SEV Redhouse Kidz
VIETNAM, Nha Nam
WORLD ENGLISH, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
FILM RIGHTS, Scott Free Productions
Right sold (Little Mouse series):
FINLAND, Tammi (Original publisher)
AUSTRALIA, Scribble/Scribe
CHINA, Beijing Yuntu Tech
DENMARK, ABC Forlag
NEPAL, Kathalaya
NEW ZEALAND, Scribble/Scribe
UK, Scribble/Scribe
Rights sold (Monster Tournament):
FINLAND: Tammi (orig.)
WORLD ARABIC: Ink Publishing
Pasi Pitkänen
Pasi Pitkänen has become known for his richly detailed illustrative work on several children’s books such as the extremely popular Monster Nanny trilogy by Tuutikki Tolonen. He has also worked at Rovio Entertainment as an illustrator, character designer, and graphic designer. Pitkänen is the illustrator of the popular Kepler62 series and the author of two Children's titles Monster Tournament and The Island of Lost Animals.
Among Pitkänen’s hobbies are quantum physics, people-watching, B-movies, insects and baking.
Riikka Jäntti
Riikka Jäntti, a 2003 graduate of University of Industrial Art of Helsinki, now part of Aalto University, is a Helsinki-based illustrator and author who has created art for both nonfiction and fairy tale books for children. Her first children’s book was published in 2005. Jäntti is best known for the adorable Little Mouse series that has publishers in 20 territories, including Australia, Nepal, and China!
In her illustrations, she uses pen and ink as well as watercolor and gouache. In 2009 Jäntti won the first-ever Tieto-Lauri, an award for children’s and juvenile non-fiction, for her illustrations in Viidakkotanssi (Jungle Dance). The book was written by Markku Löytönen about the explorer Rafael Karsten in Ecuador.
Tuutikki Tolonen
Tuutikki Tolonen is the author of several acclaimed children’s books, plays and academic articles. She teaches creative writing and has worked as an editor and reporter at Vinski, a Finnish literary magazine for children. For Monster Nanny she received the Arvid Lydecken award. Her inspiration for the Monster Nanny trilogy sparked during a family breakfast. “My son Leo, then six, said: ‘I heard on the radio yesterday that all moms have to go on vacation and monsters will take their places,” she says.
Her other bestselling series is the Agnes-series, of which the first book "Agnes and the Garden of Dreams" was in 2021 nominated for the Arvid Lydecken Award, received an honorable mention for the Runeberg Junior Award, and won the Luku Varkaus Award. Tolonen tells that the inspiration for Agnes comes for her interest for weird and inexpicable tales, ghost stories and mysteries: "I wanted to write a book my daughter Aili, then nine, would like to read - not too long, not too scary, but very curious."