The Admirable Mr Happy
By
Linda Bondestam
Malin Kivelä
Mr Happy, the loveliest and friendliest person in the world, meets his new neighbour: the bad-tempered and cranky Miss Lemon. Mr Happy takes out her rubbish and pays her bills without being disheartened by her lack of gratitude. A love story where opposites attract and persistence is the key.
The Admirable Mr Happy has been made into an animation.
About the author
Linda Bondestam (b.1977) studied to become an illustrator at Kingston University in the United Kingdom.Bondestam has illustrated dozens of children’s books for Finnish and Swedish publishers, and her books have been translated into several languages including Arabic, Belorussian, Croatian, Danish, English, Finnish, German, Latvian, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Turkish and Ukrainian. She is one of the most prominent children’s book illustrators in the Nordic countries.She has been nominated for the prestigious Finlandia Junior Prize three times, and the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award six times. She has also been recognized with nominations for the Nordic Council’s Children and Young People’s Literature Prize in 2013 and 2021, and the August Prize in 2016, 2019 and 2021.Bondestam’s collaboration with Ulf Stark on Animals That No One Has Seen Except Us was awarded the Snöbollen Prize for Swedish Picture Book of the Year in 2016, and the Nordic Council’s Children and Young People’s Literature Prize in 2017. Bondestam was also the first recipient of the Vanessa Prize (Vanessapriset) in 2016. Bondestam’s own title, My Life at The Bottom, was a pick for the White Raven Catalogue in 2021. Bondestam's picture book Chop Chop earned her the 2025 August Prize - Swedish Children’s Book of the Year.She has been sitting on chair number 11 in the Swedish Children’s Book Academy since 2019.
Author page
Malin Kivelä (b. 1974) is a Finland-Swedish writer and playwright from Helsinki. She has published novels, children’s books and plays and also translated fiction from Finnish into Swedish. Her works have received several prizes and nominations, including the YLE Literature Prize for Annanstans and Hjärtat in 2013 and 2019, as well as a prize from the Swedish Academy in 2018. In her writing she is particularly interested in chasing the smallest nuances which might not even have a name, and in exploring the realms and limits of the written word as well as the physical dimensions and effects of text.
Author page
