Wild Dog

"The author masters the flashbacks and advances the narration with ease (...). The language is assured and strong, built for storytelling. The novel is a combination of a thriller, a love story, and a nature story, and surprisingly such a combination works. For me the novel belongs to the page-turner-category."

"Pekka Juntti builds high expectations with successful characters and narration" (...) "Although Pajtim Sta tovc’ novel MY CAT YUGOSLAVIA and Juntti’s WILD DOG are geographically and linguistically far apart, they contain some of the same mystique in their spirit."

"Northern nature and love unite in journalist Pekka Juntti’s excellent debut novel."

"Juntti's rich and vibrant language delights throughout the novel (...) Juntti writes about nature, including human nature, in deep and attentive ways"

"Overall, the novel carries like a sinewy husky sled. The most important thing is the moment to be lived in, the description that is to be felt. The pages are tempting to read with suspension, while at the same time being in a hurry to see where the story is going."

"I know I like a book when I start to carry it with me and switch to an audiobook if my hands are tied up in earthly obligations. From the text, I could smell the pine needles, hear the swans, and see the dog’s feet sink into the snow. "

"Juntti writes in a romantic language but avoids mystification. The story naturally advances along many different routes, the perspectives and underlying themes are justified and above all, in balance with each other. Everything is given the space it needs. Juntti doesn’t go crazy about just one topic but combines all of them together as part of the world of the book. The controlled structure is embellished with a beautiful text that takes its time. Juntti has the eye for the small details in the landscape, but also for staying on top of the story.

Best of all, the central theme of the book hasn’t truly been recognized in fiction earlier. That of how the impact the seizure of forests and waters had on communities across Finland. Juntti is familiar with the subject: he approached the forest as one of the authors of the work “The Forest After Us” which was awarded the most prestigious literary prize, Finlandia Non-Fiction Award in 2019."

"We experience some of the story’s finer moments when Samu leaves into the desolate wilderness with a sled pulled by ten dogs. Joy and freedom overflow – until the day’s end crashes into an icy crevasse. Love and the beauty of nature are written with a rugged pen into the events of everyday life without exaggerated words or painting of the scene. ... There is plenty of symbolism in the text but it is not overemphasised. Wild Dog is a narrative that doesn’t explain: it lives. The story tightly stays in its topic and keeps the reader enthralled."

"Firstly an adventure novel, Wild Dog is also a mixture of suspense and love in the heart of the wild nature."

"Wild Dog is a powerful novel: it leads us straight to forgotten villages in northern Lapland, where people and trees take care of each other" (...) "A poignant work in which Juntti depicts strong fiction against a backdrop of true history."

"Emotional, poetic, Wild Dog does not shy away from cruelty and knows how to create addictive suspense. His stories about human, wildlife and nature are almost hypnotically luring and make this novel an undeniable success."