Novelist and playwright Sofi Oksanen has become the first Finnish woman to win the Swedish Academy's Nordic book prize.
The award has been handed out annually since 1986, and Oksanen is the fifth Finn to win it.The prize is worth 350,000 Swedish crowns or about 44,000 euros.
The Academy says she is being honoured for her literary career so far, which includes four novels as well as plays, lyrics and essays.
Oksanen will receive the honour in Stockholm on 10 April. She will then begin a tour of the Nordic countries. Her latest novel, When the Doves Disappeared, will be published in April in Sweden, Denmark and Norway. Like her international breakthrough, Purge, it is a historical novel mostly set in occupied Estonia.
Historic footsteps
The most celebrated Finnish author of her generation, Oksanen, 36, has previously won the Nordic Council Book Prize and the Finlandia Prize, among many others.
The previous Finnish winners of the Swedish Academy prize are Lars Huldén, Bo Carpelan, Paavo Haavikko and Nils Erik Enqvist, a professor who wrote in English, Swedish and Finnish. They have all died except for Swedish-language author Huldén, who is 86.