Name: The Year of the Hare
Rating: 2.9 (10 reviews)
ISBN: 9780143117926

Pico Iyer

Arto Paasilinna

Herbert Lomas

After his car hits a bunny, which ultimately survives, a man decides to quit his job, leave his wife, sell his possessions and spend a year wandering around the countryside of Finland--with the rabbit as his only companion. Original.

A Novel

The Year of the Hare

A journalist and a photographer set out on an assignment, but as they drive along they hit a hare. The hare then adopts the journalist, and together the two scamper through farcical adventures and political scandal.

Karpe Diez

A bandage of calmness and mild humor over a psihic overloaded after a stressful week. Also, for someone with no knowledge of Finnish culture, a tentative window creaking open towards that. Have you ever thought of suddently picking up just a few things and leave, abandoning everything behind? The protagonist of this story does exactly that, after the car taking him back to Helsinki from an assignment hits a hare. For him, holding that hare in his arms in the middle of the forest in a sunny summer day is the moment of epiphany. From that moment, his system of values turns upside-down and the total shift in priorities makes the time flow at a different slower, quieter pace... Why a hare, though?

Stephanie Honour

I made the mistake of reading the prologue, which glorified the book more than it deserved. It was a cute story, but I expected more. By the end I was happy to be finished.

Sandaru Ravihari

** spoiler alert **
           This book was totally different from what I imagined. Our protagonist Vatanen almost hits a hare with the car. Leaving his wife, his job as a journalist, his uneventful life behind, he grabs the hare and disappears from South Finland. At first, I thought it would be a nice story of a man spending some quality time with an animal in the wild. Do not get me wrong it still is a story about a man spending some quality time with his hare but not particularly in the wild. He would travel around North Findland, Lapland, and even to Soviet Russia on a bear hunt. He meets a priest who tries to kill the hare and a man who tries to steal the hare. Also, a Swedish lady decides she cannot leave the hare since it saved her life during a bear attack. Also, Vatanen befriends a person who tells him about some political, scandalous evidence against the president of the republic, which he later uses when he is arrested. Later, he gets drunk for months and gets engaged to a beautiful lawyer. Not only humans, but he also meets a pesky raven who steals food from him, a bear who almost devoured him, a pregnant cow. However, there were certain moments in the story, that I disliked. I looked at him from the perspective of him being an animal lover, with his work around the pregnant cow and the hare. However, he also kills and hunts the pesky raven and the bear. Also, I felt so frustrated that he did not do his best to keep the hare protected. With the pastor, he almost shot the hare and the Swedish lady who almost snatched the hare. Vatanen was too dense and calm at certain incidents.

This is also my first time reading Paasilinna. I might not understand the necessity of the social and political details in a story related to a hare. However, you realize one thing: The story was never about a hare. It was about a man who escaped his uneventful life to have some fun.

*emmie*

The international bestseller. A novel of one man's existential journey away from his life and in to the wild. With a hare. Vatanen is a journalist in Finland. The car he is riding in accidentally hits a young wild hare. The injured animal scampers off and the car moves on—without Vatanen. He has disembarked to find the hare and nurse it back to health. With the hare in his arms, Vatanen starts walking. Travelling through forests and seasons, he finds himself on a journey of comic adventures and near misses. Embracing this life, Vatanen decides to quit his job, leave his wife, sell his possessions and spend a year in the wild. As the hare slowly heals, so too does Vatanen. This is a picaresque tale of finding happiness where there was anger, simplicity where there was complexity, and meaning where there was none. It is a book in the wonderful tradition of Watership Down and Life of Pi. It is a story you will return to again and again. It is a story of a man and a wild hare.

The Year of the Hare A Novel

Reviews

Highlights