My newest short novel — and the first I have written in English.
Plot Summary
The Tram Driver is an introspective, episodic novel that follows the quiet, inner life of a middle-aged tram driver in Helsinki. Written in the first person, the story unfolds like a journal—made up of daily observations, fleeting conversations, and chance encounters with passengers and strangers in the city.
Through moments of solitude, fragments of memory, and encounters with an often indifferent urban world, the narrator reflects on lost artistic dreams, immigration, aging, and failed relationships. Themes of loneliness, identity, and cultural dislocation emerge organically in a narrative that favors mood over action.
There is no conventional plot; instead, the rhythm of the tram becomes a metaphor for the narrator’s psychological journey—marked by stops, turns, aimless loops, and occasional moments of unexpected clarity.rors the narrator's psychological journey — stops, pauses, and aimless loops — as he navigates not just the city, but his inner life, dreams, and disappointments.
Jesus In Finland
Jesus in Finland is a two-act tragicomedy (approximately 70 minutes) written in English.
The play follows a young Muslim man named Jesus, who arrives in Finland with his parents as an asylum seeker. The family lives in a reception center, caught in the long and uncertain process of waiting for residency decisions. As they struggle to adapt to a new country and its systems, tensions quietly build beneath the surface.
While waiting, Jesus begins to discover and confront his own identity, realizing that he is gay—something that places him at odds not only with his cultural background but also with the fragile environment around him. At the same time, the family faces increasing pressure as their asylum application is reviewed.
In a cruel twist of fate, Jesus’s parents receive a negative decision and are ordered to be deported. Shortly after, Jesus is violently attacked and killed by a racist man in a bar. Tragically, just as his life is taken, the immigration office issues a positive residence decision—for him.
Blending dark humor with deep tragedy, the play explores themes of identity, belonging, bureaucracy, intolerance, and the devastating irony of systems that fail the very people they are meant to protect.
The play has not yet been performed.