They have left their beloved Moominvalley – for the mysterious lighthouse island of Moominpappa at Sea – and no one has seen them since. It is November, the days are closing in, and no one knows where the Moomins have gone and when they might come back.

She lost herself in her work shut in her island hut, which she described in a letter as being surrounded by ‘a thick fog; all four windows white and the cottage seems to be sailing through empty space.I am making this sound a little more bleak than it probably really is, but something about 2/3's of the way into this book inspired me to a not so good feeling depression. Drame gospodina sa guči torbicom o apsurdnosti života sam pročitao jednom i mislim da im se neću više vraćati, roman „Novembar u Dolini Mumijevih” čitam treći put. Umesto njih, šest anksioznih junaka (četiri junaka poznata iz prethodnih delova serijala i dva nova) pokušavaju da preosmisle mrtvo vreme novembra nastupilo usled sopstvene praznine i odsutnosti porodice trolova. The faint whisper of rain and running water was still there and it had the same tender note of solitude and perfection.

While the Moomin stories all have a slightly unnerving, mysterious quality, but this one is outright existential. Following this work, Jansson later stated that she "couldn't go back and find that happy Moominvalley again" and so decided to stop writing the Moomin books. I worried the book would end with rather nihilistic pessimism – Toft staring out at a bleak sea – but in fact there is a glimmer of hope: Toft spies the Moomins’ boat approaching and runs to meet them. Instead, Tove Jansson let the values of the Moomin family be adapted by other creatures left in Moominvalley, who are trying to live as the family used to. The book also felt unique to me for its Scandinavian qualities: the strange sprite-like creatures, woodland settings and short winter days, and the slight air of depression.Perhaps the most fun aspect of the book is Jansson’s original black and white line drawings of her peculiarly loveable creations.

Moominvalley in November ( Swedish: Sent i november, 'Late in November') is the ninth and final book in the Moomin series by Finnish author Tove Jansson, and was first published in her native Swedish in 1970, and in English in 1971. Iako su potom negde sledili stihovi „tu se svi veselo igraju a šume smehom odjekuju”, ostalo mi je uvek nejasno kako i, pobogu, zašto se oni igraju a „mrak ih snašo”? Somehow the uptight dowager manages to be one of the most sympathetic characters in all of Moominvalley. Mymble never dreamed, she slept when she felt like it and woke when there was anything worthwhile waking up for.Toft, a new character, is of course Jansson's avatar in this story, which adds a melancholy element of metafiction as she tries to say goodbye to the characters that had overtaken her life. He had that simple but rare ability to retain his own warmth, he gathered it all round him and lay very still and took care not to dream.

As a Finnish citizen whose mother tongue was Swedish, she was part of the Swedish-speaking Finns minority. As The Times Literary Supplement put it, Moominvalley in November is "possibly the cleverest of the Moomin books. Hidden lichens and mosses began to grow, and they grew like a big soft carpet until they took over the whole forest.What a perfect sick day read, filled with the loveliest bunch of characters even though the Moomin family is nowhere to be found. Tove Jansson wrote and illustrated her first Moomin book, The Moomins and the Great Flood (1945), during World War II.