Olli Jalonen is a Finnish author born in Helsinki (1954) and currently living in Hämeenlinna, Finland. He has studied Social Sciences (M.A. and L.Soc.Sc) and Literature (Ph.D) and has worked in journalism before becoming a full-time writer in 1981; he also studied at the University of Tampere (1973-2006) and at Trinity College Dublin (1979–1980). His debut book ‘Unien tausta’ was published in 1978 and since that he has published over 20 books (mostly novels and short story collections) and drama. Some of his novels have been translated into German, Swedish, Norwegian, Estonian and Latvian, and short stories in different languages. Jalonen has received several literary awards since his debut book (‘J.H. Erkko Prize’ for the best debut book in 1978), including the ‘Finlandia Prize‘ in 1990 for his novel ‘Isäksi ja tyttäreksi‘ and again in 2018 for his novel ‘Taivaanpallo’, and the ‘Eino Leino Prize’ in 1990. He has also had three nominations for the ‘Nordic Council Literature Prize‘. Jalonen’s writing shows a delight in playing with the nature of reality: one of his trademarks as a prosewriter is his desire to bring together his earlier works to form part of new, larger entities, thus making his texts comment upon one another. For decades he has been interested in the island of St. Helena and the astronomer and scientist Edmond Halley (1656-1742). For instance Olli Jalonen‘s novel ’14 solmua Greenwichiin’ (14 Knots to Greenwich, 2008) centres on the story of a fictional round-the-world race by land and sea that starts and ends in Greenwich. It moves between suspense fiction and autobiography in an unusual and often enigmatic way. The novel ‘Taivaanpallo’ (The Celestial Sphere, 2018) tells about the rays of the Enlightenment and life on St. Helena and London in the 1680s. The story of Edmond Halley and his trusted apprentice Angus continues in ‘Merenpeitto’ (The Art of Living under Water, 2019).
