Gifts from the Sentient Forest
Communication & Collaboration Between People & Trees in Northern Finland

Throughout my life, I’ve never changed my opinion because someone shouted at me. Instead, peaceful encounters—especially through literature and with plants—have shaped my thinking. Literature invites us into another’s mind, allowing us to engage with unfamiliar perspectives without judgment. Plants offer a different kind of dialogue.

Raised on a farm by a passionate gardener, I’ve been surrounded by plants since childhood. I had my own garden from age three and played in ancient oak woods near our home. As a gardener, you notice plant autonomy: they choose whether to grow or flourish. I might plant a neat row of radishes, but they blur the lines as they germinate. Humans may guide, but plants decide. I never imagined they might be interested in me.

Before the Gifts from the Sentient Forest project began, John Ryan hosted two events at the University of Oulu — a symposium and a creative writing workshop in the Botanical Gardens. At the symposium, I was in my comfort zone, discussing literature and human perceptions of the vegetal world. But in the greenhouse, I was asked to talk to a plant. I chose a fruiting orchid, who seemed displeased to see me. Yet she helped me consider how a plant might perceive a human.

The first retreat in Äkäslompolo pushed me further. It inspired a shift in the novel I had shelved: The Phoenix, the Selkie and the Stoat (https://www.wattpad.com/story/392806548-the-phoenix-the-selkie-and-the-stoat). As a queer, multilingual writer, I wanted to include these aspects of selfhood without making them central problems. The story focuses on bereavement — specifically the concept of surutyö or trauerarbeit, the work of processing grief. Alongside this, the queer family structure and multilingualism emerge naturally. I also wanted to address ecological concerns without burdening the child character with solving the climate crisis.

During the retreat, I reflected on the forest’s healing powers — not just for humans, but how the forest might ask us to heal it. My academic understanding of forest networks — trees, fungi, insects and grubs — needed to become fiction. Walking through the forest near Stena, I imagined it communicating through voices, movements, and creatures. In my room, I wrote a scene where a character climbs into a konkelo — a fallen tree resting on a sister tree — and heard the forest’s voices. I let the forest speak through me, uncensored. While writing, I heard Mira’s singing blended into the forest’s voice, which became part of my story.

The Phoenix, the Selkie and the Stoat is a fantasy set on a fictional island in the Finnish archipelago. In reality, many islands are Swedish-speaking, while the mainland is Finnish-speaking; I reversed this. Tulikki, the daughter of a deceased Phoenix, is learning to become the new Phoenix. Her other mother, Jill, is a stoat/human shape-shifter from the mainland, and her father, Nestori, is a Selkie. The characters process grief by tending to their environment and relationships. There are no miraculous solutions, but the ending is hopeful. My aim is to help readers engage with forest sentience as part of healing and this was portrayed through my work within the project.

 

All images on this page are copyright of the artist Lydia Kokkola.

Top: Lydia Kokkola and Milja Laine. 'Map of Muuntosaari and the Mainland' (2025).