Vacations in the country

"On Saltkroka Island" is not Astrid Lindgren's most famous novel, it does not have any dizzying adventures or pranks like "Pippi" and "Emil", you will not laugh at it like at Karlsson, not many events happen here at all. This novel is about a family with four children renting a house on an island in the Baltic Sea and spending the summer there. Actually, all the events do not go beyond the experience of most children spending their holidays at the dacha: they sail on a boat, create secret societies, do not return home on time, play with animals, and grow, grow! And the adults at this time are establishing a dacha life and rethinking life.

So, there are four children in the family, but there is no mother, the role of mother is played by the older sister, who is 19 years old. She takes care of the father and three younger brothers, one seven-year-old and two teenagers. They all find company on the island, and as the story progresses, the emphasis shifts from one age to another, so there are no key and secondary characters, as well as key events, in the book. The main character here is life itself: children, adults, animals, nature, and the old estate, and events, events take their course, joy and sadness hand in hand, warm days are replaced by rainy ones, pleasant adventures are replaced by troubles, holidays, love, worries, tears ...

This book evokes memories of summer at the dacha, of glassed-in terraces, of cool nights, of the fragrant herbs of the meadows, of neighbors from other plots, and – so strangely! – it leaves a feeling of warmth and at the same time coolness, freshness, something close and understandable and at the same time elusive. Everything seems to be covered with a light haze, but also as if crystal clear. The great master Astrid Lindgren.

Let's go back to our childhood in the countryside.