The Moomins and the Great Flood by Tove Jansson (1945)

I read some Moomin books in my childhood but the memories are extremely fuzzy now. Obviously this wasn't one of them - it is the first in the series and wasn't translated until 2005. This first visit to the Moomin mind is a rolling series of adventures taken part in by Moominmamma and Moomintroll himself, starting in a great forest where they team up with a little creature, who is never known as anything but that, and has a waspish but fearful personality. Jansson's illustration of him is delightful in its typical cheekiness. Along the way, during a wade through a great dark swamp which, like the forest, is lit with luminous flowers, they use one of these, a tulip, to light their path. From it emerges, to their surprise, a beautiful girl with long blue hair; her name is Tulippa (I'm guessing if Finnish's usual modes are followed, this will be pronounced Tulip-pa). They reach the base of a huge mountain disconcerted and sad, longing for sunshine in this gloomy place. A door opens up in the rock face, and an eccentric man invites them inside, to his specially constructed world of incredible colours and sweets. If this isn't a good part of Roald Dahl's inspiration for Willy Wonka I don't know what is - the echoes are phenomenal. Did he read Swedish or Finnish, being a Norwegian? The man's sunshine is artificial, made from a huge lamp, so they move on, taking a switchback railway (Indiana Jones, anyone?) through the mountain and out to the shore of a huge ocean. A boat ride with Hattifatteners ends with a sea-troll guiding them into the harbour of a land carpeted with meadows of flowers and owned by a bright-red-haired boy who falls headlong for Tulippa, and whose admiration is returned. The boy recalls to Moominmamma that Moominpappa had passed that way very recently, taking the road to the south. Leaving Tulippa with the boy, the original trio immediately start on a search for the lost Moomin, but it starts to rain and doesn't stop for days. In the end their world is almost drowned in the huge flood. All that is visible are the tops of the trees and the very high parts of hills. By discovering an old marabou-stork's lost glasses, Moomintroll ensures his help. He flies the three of them on his back in a last ditch search for Moominpappa, whom they fear has drowned. Of course they finally spy him, lodged at the top of a tree, and their mutual joy is unbounded. He is sad; he had been away from them building them a house which has now been swept away. As the flood dissipates and the sunshine they've been searching for floods the world in its place, they start wandering around. Coming upon a beautiful valley with a meadow at its bottom, what do they see there? Moominpappa is elated: his house has landed in the perfect spot. In typical Jansson style, they almost live there happily ever after - except for the times when they go wandering for a change. A stunningly gentle story, full of humour and odd twists.