My Flying Grandma

Nine-year-old Joel is not happy when his parents drops him off at his grandma’s while they leave for a business trip to Kuwait. Joel hardly knows his grandma, but she seems awfully boring: she only eats readymade soups and spends all her time playing solitaire on her computer. It is almost as if she has forgotten that Joel is even there.

Until one morning when Joel notices that his grandma has grown wings on her back. Suddenly, she begins to fly all over town, and even saves a couple of odd characters. Has Joel’s grandma turned into a superhero?

My Flying Grandma is a new and unique take on the classic superhero tale. The warm and moving story is highlighted by Jenny Lucander’s atmospheric illustrations.

Publishing information

Year of publication

2022

Page count

Original title

När farmor flög

Original publisher

Förlaget M

Awards & nominations

Nominations

2023

Runeberg Junior Prize

About the author

Annika Sandelin (b.1972) is an established author and poet, who worked as a librarian before she became a full-time writer. Apart from writing, she also teaches a writing course in how to write children’s and youth literature. Her latest works include Silkmonkey’s Laughter (2019) and Moominvalley’s Alphabet (Mumindalens alfabet, 2021). Her newest book My Flying Grandma was released in spring 2022.In 2014 Sandelin was nominated for the Nordic Council Prize and has since received prestigious awards like the Anni Swan Medal for Silkmonkey’s Laughter in 2021, which is the oldest children’s literature award in Finland. She has also been recognized for her translations as her translation made the IBBY International Honorary List in 2022.

Author page

Jenny Lucander (b. 1975) is a graphic artist and children’s book creator. Her acclaimed works are frequently used in magazines and advertising.Lucander’s works have been nominated for the Nordic Council Children and Young People’s Literature Prize in 2016 and 2017 and she won the award in 2020. Other nominations include the Runeberg Junior Prize in 2016, being nominated for the Elsa Beskow plaque in 2020, and the Most Beautiful book in 2021. The illustrator was also nominated for the prestigious Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award (ALMA) in 2022.Lucander studied Children’s book illustration and creation at the university of Gothenburg, at The School of Design and Crafts (HDK) between 2010 and 2011. She also studied storytelling at the same institution in 2013. She also has a Master of Social Sciences degree, and has a bachelor’s degree in social psychology.

Author page

Reviews

"Annika Sandelin’s touching book is beautifully illustrated by Jenny Lucander’s bright and angular drawings. One nice feature of the images is that Joel and his grandma are of different ethnicities and colours, but this is never mentioned in the story. Instead, the focus of the narrative is on learning to open yourself up to other people."

B.J. Woodstein, Swedish Book Review

With the book My Flying Grandma, Sandelin and Lucander consolidate their positions as our main children's book creators. There lays nothing less than an Ulf Stark- shimmer over Sandelin's way of storytelling, with a streak of Stark's signum in the sensitive portrayal of a boy, spiced up with a pervasive melancholy and basic concern. - Annika Sandelin and Jenny Lucander have created a grain of gold in children's book publication. Here, God lives in the detail, exquisitely chosen.

Mia Österlund, Hufvudstadsbladet