Finnish Artist Inge Look

These are Inge Look postcards I've received.  I really love them, I want to figure out which one I like best and see if i can get a larger print!

2081.  Germany.

Hello my name is Maken.  I like to hear music from Heiko Brauning and David Plum.  Please stay healthy.  Maken

2061.  Turku, Finland

Inge Look #52

Greetings from rainy Turku, Finland.  I live here with my man and cat Helmi, Pearl in English.  We love to go birdwatching with my man.  Today we saw two tufted ducks.  My dream is to see mandarin duck some day.  I can't wait summer!  Stay healthy.  Miia

2060.  Dresden, Germany

Inge Look #72

17 May 2021

Hello Chris, My name is Amelie and I live in Dresden, where I study hydrology at university.  In my spare time I enjoy reading books, listening to music, playing card & board games as well as going for walks.  My favourite book genre is urban fantasy.  I like Genevieve Cogman's "The Invisible Library" a lot.  I wish you all the best & stay healthy!  Kindest regards, Amelie.

2052.  nr. Amsterdam, The Netherlands

IngeLook

10 May 2021

My name is Jose and I live near Amsterdam.  My biggest hobby is postcrossing but also working with my husband on the genealogy of our families for almost 15 years.  We share a mutual hobby.  I also love spring and the beach, and got to visit Amsterdam.  Warm greetings and stay healthy.  Jose.

2070.  Germany

Hello my name is Karin.  I like to hear music from Heiku Brainning and David Pliin.  Please stay healthy.  Karin.

AND

1944.  Minden, Germany

Postcard:  Inge Look/29

I love sending off the old ladies postcards.  They always make me smile.  Maybe I should start collecting them, too!  Spring is just around the corner and I can't wait for it to be warm again!  All the best, take care, Ute

1943.  Emmen, the Netherlands

Inge Look #36

Hi, I'm from Emmen, in the north-east of Holland.  Hope this card may bring a smile on your face.  It always happens to me...so funny!  Best wishes and enjoy Easter!  Gea

802.  Kouvola, FINLAND

Inge Look #16

I'm Kati and live in Kouvola City, Finland.  Happy Postcrossing!

1303.  Many Greetings from Finland

Inge Look

30 July 2018

I live in Kiuruvesi, it's a very small town in the middle of Finland.  Enjoy your day and smile.  Tarja

ALSO

672.  Inge Look card

mailed from Germany

Hello Chris,  Before I started with Postcrossing I never heard about Inge Look, but I am a big fan now!  I hope you enjoy this card.  In Bremen where I live we are a little bit away from winter - thank goodness!  Our sons look forward to Christmas.  Happy Postcrossing, Steffi

627.  Inge Look (Finnish artist) - sent from GERMANY

Inge Look #34

Hope you like this card.  Life in ......(I can't understand what she's written here)..I have 2 grandchildren.  Angelika

512.  Hanko, FINLAND

Inge Look #11

Hello Chris!  My name is Ulrika, I am 47 years old.  I live in the sourthern most town of Finland: Hanko.  It is a small town but we have 30 km of beaches over here.  Have a wonderful day! Ulrika

35. Lucifer's Tears by James Thompson

Helsinki Inspector Kari Vaara #2
Listened on Audible
2011 G. P. Putnam's
336 pgs.
Contemporary Murder Mystery
Finished 6/14/16
Goodreads rating: 3.84 - 1665 ratings
My rating: 4
Setting: Contemporary Helsinki

First line/s: "The baby kicks against me from my hand and rouses me from my nap."

My comments:  There are three scenarios twisting and turning through this book, two investigations that Kari Vaara is working on, and a home situation that he must stay on top of.  He's moved to Helsinki from the Arctic Circle with his very-pregnant wife, a move he didn't want to make.  He has a brash young partner that tries him.  He's having debilitating headaches that you know aren't good.  He's investigating the murder of a shady Russian businessman's wife and trying to sniff out the facts about possible Nazi collaboration by his adored Finnish grandfather.  The cherry on top is that his wife Kate's siblings have come to stay with them from America.  Not only are they intolerant about Finnish customs and history, but one is a Bible thumper and the other's an alcoholic.  Kari Vaara is smart, an honorable, likable man.  Although a couple of the scenarios are wrapped up in this book, another is begun, and the possibilities at the end of the book are scintillating.  Can't wait to read more!  My only critical note is that there is a LOT of 20th century Finnish history mentioned, the names and situations are unfamiliar to me so they were a bit tedious and difficult to follow at times.

Goodreads synopsis:  Inspector Kari Vaara returns, more haunted than ever, in the follow- up to Snow Angels, "a must for fans of the international crime novel." (Booklist) 
     The Sufia Elmi case left Kari Vaara with a scarred face, chronic insomnia, a constant migraine, and a full body count's worth of ghosts. Now it's a year later, in Helsinki, and Kari is working the graveyard shift in the homicide unit, terrified that his heavily pregnant wife will miscarry again after she lost the twins just after Christmas. 
     Kari is pushed into investigating a ninety-year-old national hero for war crimes committed during World War II. The Interior Minister demands a conclusion of innocence, preserving Finland's heroic perception about itself and its role in the war, but Germany wants extradition. 
     In a seeming coincidence, Kari is drawn into the murder-by-torture case of Iisa Filippov, the philandering wife of a Russian businessman. Her lover is clearly being framed for the crime-and Ivan Filippov's arrogance and nonchalance point the finger at him. But he's being protected from above, leading Kari to the corrupt corridors of power. Soon the past and present collide in ways no one could have anticipated.

77. Snow Angels - James Thompson

#1 Kari Vaara, Finnish (Lapland) chief police inspector

Read on my iPhone

2010, G. P. Putnam

264 pgs.

Adult Murder Mystery

Finished 12/20/2014

Goodreads rating: 3.70

My rating:   4.5 Top-notch

Contemporary Finland

1st sentence/s:  "I'm in Hullu Poro, the Crazy Reindeer, the biggest bar and restaurant in this part of the Arctic Circle.  It was remodeled nolong ago, but pine boards line the walls and ceiling, like an old Finnish farmhouse.  Nouveau rustic decor."

My comments:  I've always been fascinated with the "idea" of Lapland - the Scandinavian winter (not the cold, harsh, DARK realities, but the pristine white ones), and complimentary artistry of Jan Brett.  This story takes us into the Arctic Circle at the very darkest time of year and gives it all the twist of a brutal murder from the point-of-view of the cop that has to solve it.  The twists and turns in the story are believable and were well appreciated. Believable characters, particularly the protagonists.  Kari Vaara's wife, Kate, an American expat who happens to be pregnant, is beginning to feel the depression of the 24-hours nights, which adds to the tension of the crime-solving. Searching for more information on American James Thompson in anticipation of more in the series, I discovered that he died suddenly a few months ago. Bummer.

Goodreads book summary:  Kaamos: Just before Christmas, the darkest time of the year in Lapland, above the Arctic Circle. The unrelenting darkness and extreme cold cause everyone to go just a little bit insane, whether or not they’ve just killed someone… 
          A beautiful Somalian refugee-turned-actress is found murdered on a reindeer farm, gruesomely mutilated, a racial slur carved into her chest. Inspector Kari Vaara, head of the rural police force, is under great pressure not only to solve this crime himself, without the help of the big-city cops from Helsinki, but also to keep the potentially explosive case out of the news. Sufia Elmi had become a tabloid fixture, and her death—not to mention the awful way she met it—is sure to send shock waves across this insular, secretly racist country. Was this murder a hate crime, a sex crime—or both?
          Kari is dealing with culture shock at home, too. His wife, Kate, is a young American woman, newly pregnant with their first child. She doesn’t understand much about Finnish customs or the Finns themselves and is struggling to come to terms with her new home. Kari himself is haunted by his rough childhood and his past, and even as he tries to shape a new life with Kate, the past keeps biting at his heels: the rich man his ex-wife left him for years ago may be Sufia’s killer. 

31. Available Dark – Elizabeth Hand

Thomas Dunne/ Minotaur Books, 2012

246 pgs.

for: adults

Rating:  Mixed feelings, but I liked it….quite a bit, after much thought

Setting:  NYC for a short time, then Finland for a bit, the rest in Iceland in winter…probably December, when there’s almost no daylight, just gray light for a few hours or total darkness.

First line/s:  There had been more trouble, as usual.  In November I’d headed north to an island off the coast of Maine, hoping to score an interview that might jump-start the cold wreckage of my career as a photographer, dead for more than thirty years.  Instead, I got sucked into some seriously bad shit.  The upshot was that I was now back in the city, almost dead broke, with winter coming down and even fewer prospects than when I’d left weeks earlier.  I dealt with this the way I usually did:  I bought a bottle of Jack Daniel’s, cranked my stereo, and got hammered.”

OSS:  Photographer Cass Neary, user of Jack Daniels and meth and uppers and downers and anything she can get her hands on, goes to Finland to authenticate a series of unbelievable photos; then gets pulled into a series of murders all revolving around Viking mythology and Black Metal music

I figured out that the references to Maine, her bad experiences there, and some other references that she had to stay low, were references to the first book about Cass/Cassandra Neary called Generation Loss.  Because of the island off the coast of Maine setting (! ! !) I do plan to find it and read it this summer.

This was really quite fascinating, incredibly dark, and thought-provoking.  Because I spent 24 hours in Iceland (in August, when the sun hardly went down), I’ve always wondered about winter there. Cheap flights in winter, horribly expensive ones in summer. Well, this is a view that I would never, ever see or think about as an average tourist.  The current punk scene, I guess you’d call it.  But Cass – and all her acquaintance’s fascination with death and its mythologies, is a pretty dark trip for someone who thrives on sunshine…..(me)……  This is one of those books that teach you, make you think outside the box, helps you make connections you might never have made, ever.  And, ultimately, I liked it.