The Burning Stones

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Authors: Antti Tuomainen & David HackstonCrime & mystery | Fiction in translationPublished on 14th August 2025 by Orenda Books in the United Kingdom.Paperback / softback | 300 page s 198mm x 129mm | 0g A top saleswoman at a Finnish sauna company must outwit the police and a murderer when her boss is found dead … in a sauna. A darkly funny, tense new thriller from ‘The funniest writer in Europe’ (The Times) ‘The best comic crime novel you’ll read this year’ Abir Mukherjee 'Suspense is uppermost in this adroit mix of psychological thriller, whodunnit and middle-aged rom-com. Comedy is still pervasive … the novel’s glorious gallery of weirdos' Sunday Times Book of the Month 'Finnish author Tuomainen has a talent for creating offbeat characters … [a] tense, pacy novel, laced with the author’s trademark laconic humour' Guardian Book of the Month 'It may seem hard to find good comic crime-writers, but clearly we haven’t been looking in Finland … simultaneously thrilling and evocative of the mundanity of life, and also very funny indeed' Telegraph Saunas, love and a ladleful of murder… A cold-blooded killer strikes at the hottest moment: the new head of a sauna-stove company is murdered … in the sauna. Who has turned up the temperature and burned him to death? The evidence points in the direction of Anni Korpinen – top salesperson and the victim’s successor at Steam Devil. And as if hitting middle-age, being in a marriage that has lost its purpose, and struggling with work weren’t enough, Anni realizes that she must be quicker than both the police and the murderer to uncover who is behind it all – before it’s too late… From the international bestselling author of The Man Who Died and The Rabbit Factor, comes a darkly funny, delightfully tense new thriller that showcases humanity at its most bare – in middle age, suspected of murder and, of course, in a sauna… ‘Showcases Antti’s trademark deadpan humour and crime plots focused on intriguingly quirky individuals. An utter delight’ Vaseem Khan 'Just what you want from Antti Tuomainen, the brilliant moulding of apparent mundanity into a which-way-now thrill ride, with humour drier than a desert snake’s belly’ Ian Moore ‘The funniest writer in Europe’ The Times ‘Hilarious, beautifully penned and startlingly inventive. No other writer can come up with more ways to kill you in a sauna, and The Burning Stones cements Tuomainen’s position as the king of the humorous crime caper’ Abir Mukherjee ‘Laconic, thrilling and warmly human – hugely enjoyable' Christopher Brookmyre ‘Antti turns the heat up with this wryly comic thriller. You'll sweat along with the characters!’ Douglas Skelton 'You don’t expect to laugh when you’re reading about terrible crimes, but that’s what you’ll do when you pick up one of Tuomainen’s decidedly quirky thrillers' New York Times ‘Finland's greatest export’ M.J. Arlidge ‘A refreshing change from the decidedly gloomier crime fiction for which Scandinavia is known’ Publishers Weekly ‘Right up there with the best’ Times Literary SupplementPraise for Antti Tuomainen ‘Delightfully funny’ Guardian 'Deftly plotted, poignant and perceptive in its wry reflections on mortality and very funny' Irish Times ‘Fresh and witty' Chris Ewan ‘A thrilling and hilarious read’ Liz Nugent ‘Charming, funny and clever’ Literary Review ‘A delight from start to finish’ Big Issue 'Original and brilliant story-telling' Helen FitzGerald 'Finnish criminal chucklemeister Tuomainen is channelling Carl Hiassen' Sunday Times ‘A thriller with black comedy worth of Nabokov’ Telegraph Show more