In a world only a little different from our own, there exists a home furnishings store called LitenVärld. That's "Small World" in Swedish, but it turns out that neither the store nor the world is particularly small. Both are places where people can get lost, and that's exactly where Nino Cipri's story begins: a missing grandmother, a labyrinth of affordable room solutions, and two employees who are also lost, albeit emotionally, and hoping desperately that they can help everyone get found again.

Ava and Jules discover an anomaly in one of the showrooms in LitenVärld. The rooms presumably have Swedish names, but Ava only ever refers to them by the snarky monikers she and Jules developed: "Midlife Crisis Mom," "Nihilist Bachelor Cube" and "Newly Retired Swinger" are among my favorites. In the labyrinth of those design-by-committee nightmares there comes yet another nightmare, the sudden appearance of a wormhole. Wormholes are apparently attracted by the random and confusing layout of LitenVärld, and poor Ursula Nouri wanders into one accidentally, presumably because she's unable to really distinguish between "Dimensional Portal" and "Parental Basement Dweller."

The idea is more cute than anything else, and this novella didn't lean too hard on it before getting into the real heart of the story, which is Jules’ and Ava’s (non-)relationship, which has recently—as in, three days prior—imploded. They're still raw from all the hurt and anger, and they're probably the worst possible duo to send on an interdimensional rescue mission.

Or maybe the best.

Because despite herself, Ava respects the heck out of Jules' calm under pressure and their brave curiosity. And Jules definitely has to appreciate Ava’s level-headed caution and emotional endurance. There’s still a lot of good things between them, if only they can stop fighting long enough to see it. But this isn’t a gooey story about getting back together. It’s a much more nuanced story about how to still respect someone when your deeper incompatibility becomes clear, and how to find friendship in the wreckage of romance.

The novella also manages to deal with larger points about wealth inequality, gender discrimination, and mental health. LitenVärld is a toxic environment that doesn’t protect Jules’ nonbinary identification or Ava’s depression, and only wants to wring as much work out of them as possible. A lot of this is down to Tricia, the humorless wretch who helms the store. Tricia is pitch-perfect as a corporate manager, in that I despised her and the culture she enables. From the VHS tape she played in lieu of giving actual explanations of the wormhole phenomenon to the paltry offer of a single gift card to Pasta and Friends for a volunteer, she was the most awful of all the monsters Ava encountered. Her chirpy, pedantic dialogue is the perfect distillation of all the terrible bosses you've ever had, especially if you've ever worked in retail, and her obsession with toeing the line at her workers' expense is a devastating commentary on the state of corporate America today.

In fact, every wicked thing that Ava and Jules encounter is pretty much a commentary on how corporations want to devour you whole, drain you dry, and obliterate you for brand disloyalty—figuratively, of course, but also quite literally. No matter the universe, capitalism sucks.

Fortunately, though, there are infinite universes, and infinite ways to fight back. Jules knows how to jump in with both feet, and Ava knows how to endure when the going gets tough. Their minimum-wage-assignment-turned-swashbuckling-adventure is a smart, thrilling work of hope for anyone caught in a heteronormative, capitalist grind.

This was delightful, in turns creepy and touching and rage-inducing, with some proper 'holy shit' moments. Will be keeping an eye on whatever Cipri writes next! My first 5-star read of the year!

Anyone who has been to an Ikea knows that it is a lawless place that violates physics and exists in a purely liminal space between realities. One minute you’re in a perfect model apartment, organized into two hundred flawlessly neat square feet, and the next you’re buying cutlery with a Swedish name that makes the less mature among us giggle. Nino Cipro’s new novella, graciously given to me by Tor.com publishing, takes this concept on a literal level, to contain a twisty work that contains both fun and fear into a slim volume packed with good old fashioned anti-capitalism.

Ava and Jules are recent exes, still awkwardly working together at the same Swedish big-box store that is definitely NOT Ikea. Stuck in a dead-end job, they spend the day trying to awkwardly avoid each other, each caught in the things they said and did wrong, when one day an old lady goes missing at the store. As the two most junior employees, Ava and Jules are assigned to go look for her, discovering a corporate wormhole that literally brings them across universes.

As might be easily guessed by the description, Finna is an extremely funny book, a dark look at corporate culture and just how much we buy into the whole capitalism thing. It also is painfully true, as a millenial; I know so many friends who have taken shitty, dead-end jobs and then ended up stuck there, unable to see a way out. You quit and you can’t afford your rent. You stay at your job and you don’t have the energy to apply for anything new. What else are you supposed to do?

Though Ava and Jules float through only a few worlds in their quest to find the missing old lady, the creativity presented is boundless. There’s something of the furniture store in each one, but how that might show is different, from fly trap chairs to a submarine operating on a barter system. There are glimpses of the familiar; just enough to make everything utterly, delightfully stranger.

Perhaps my favorite part of Finna was the relationship between Ava and Jules. It felt raw and real, that longing when you still love someone but know that you make an absolutely horrible couple and you have to find a way to live without the person in your life. That they’re co-workers is a good layer of complication; it’s one thing to break up and then never see each other again, but another when you potentially have to see each other every day. Even as they travel through worlds, they’re trying to figure each other out, see if they can forge a future as just friends. No spoilers, but it’s heart-breaking and wonderful and all too real.

For all the wormholes traveled and all the alternate humanities presented, Finna is a very human, very real story. It can be read in one sitting, but takes longer to digest. It’s a must read for the upcoming months, so go ahead, curl up in a chair and prepare to be unable to put it down.

This story caught my attention from an article on Tor.com. To quote the author:

“This story mixes together a lot of things that are close to my heart: queer relationships and queer feelings, the everyday awfulness of low-wage work, wormholes, and carnivorous furniture. It’s a story about what we can and can’t escape from: capitalism and accountability, labor and love.”

Queer feelings and carnivorous furniture, you say? Sign me absolutely all of the way up for this story, please.

Finna is the adventures of Ava and Jules, who work at LitenVärld, a big box furniture store that is definitely-not-IKEA-but-also-absolutely-definitely-IKEA.

A shopper’s grandmother has gone missing in the showroom area, and due to their being the lowest on the seniority tree, it’s up to Ava and Jules to find her. Color them both surprised when they find out that the showroom is suddenly full of portals to other dimensions – or as Jules puts it: ‘creepy Scandinavian Narnia’.

Ava and Jules just broke up a week ago though, and so on top of multi-dimensional missing persons rescue, and yes, carnivorous furniture, these two are dealing with a host of emotional shenanigans.

I really enjoyed this one. Every time I go to IKEA, I end up getting lost in the various showrooms they’ve got set up, so it was easy to imagine the idea of inter-dimensional wormholes opening up in one. I love how this book labels the showrooms too: Nihilist Bachelor Cube, Coked-out Divorcée, Midlife Crisis Mom. It made me giggle on that alone.

It was a fun, snarky, funny, and feelsy adventure. I liked Ava, but Jules stole the show for me by being snarky and full of wit in the face of everything, and I wanted them to succeed in everything, ever. ❤

All told, this was a quick, fantastic read! Much recommend!~

Note to publisher: This review is scheduled to go live on 24 February 2020.

Ava has organized her work schedule at Not!IKEA to avoid any contact with her ex, Jules, and she is therefore deeply resentful of being called in to sub on a day she was supposed to have off. Of course, she's sharing a shift with Jules, and it's awkward as fuck. To make matters worse, a customer's grandmother goes missing in the depths of the store, and it becomes pretty obvious that she's disappeared into a wormhole. As the two newest employees, Ava and Jules are tapped to go chasing through the multiverse together to find the missing woman.

My favorite thing about Finna is that Nino Cipri could have easily let the jokey premise be the book. It's pretend-IKEA! There are wormholes! That's an excellent premise, and I'd have been there for it. Cipri sends Ava and Jules through a fun, imaginative series of worlds, though I'd argue that the worldbuilding for the regular-world side of things is even stronger. When the wormhole opens up, the manager at Ava and Jules's branch of Not!IKEA -- it's called LitenVärld -- puts on a training video about wormholes, and everybody goofs on it and hopes they won't have to be the one to do anything about it.

<blockquote>"Are we getting overtime for this?" someone else asked.

Ava glanced up long enough to see Tricia shake her head. "Not unless you remain in the other worlds past eighty hours in a single pay period. But! I do have a couple of Pasta and Friends gift cards for the brave volunteers."</blockquote>

I loled at this bit. Cipri perfectly captures the combination of annoyance and resignation that goes along with working a job like this. You know it sucks. Not having it would suck more. You're willing to work the fucking job, that part's whatever; but you're constantly teetering right on the brink of willingness to go along with management that insists on pretending a fair transaction of work for wages is taking place and everything's fun and fine. I loved that nobody's unduly surprised about the sudden existence of wormholes at their shitty retail job. Ava and Jules and all the other employees are just like, yeah, well, this fuckin figures.

All to reiterate: I'd have been here for this book if it had just been its premise! But Cipri uses the short space of a novella beautifully to develop their characters. You're in on the premise because it's funny, but you're in on the characters because they're sad. Ava's truly grieving the loss of her relationship, and the things that challenged her and Jules as a couple come back to challenge them again as a wormhole retrieval team. Cipri does a beautiful job of getting the reader in on Ava and Jules as a team without exactly suggesting that they would work as a couple. Neither is it suggested that they can or should work as a couple; Cipri's thesis about them is that they could be something, given enough time to figure it out. It's a lovely, hopeful way of thinking about relationships. Ava and Jules's negotiation of who they are, who they've been to each other, and who they might be to each other in the future provides a marvelous emotional underpinning to this extremely fun, queer SF adventure.

Note: I received an e-ARC of Finna from the publisher for review consideration. This has not affected the contents of my review.

A short story! I was hoping it was about to expand, but then it was over too soon. Fun premise of wormholes to other universes opening between furniture showrooms in an Ikea-like megashop. The heart of the story is new adult, about relationships and self-understanding and mental health, between two employees at the shop who journey through the wormhole to find a missing woman (or her appropriate replacement from another universe). Promising and fun, I will read more by Nino Cipri.

Finna by Nino Cipri, a short quirky novella. A wormhole has opened in the store and customers are missing, this quirky story to rescue the customers has some laughs and some eyerolls.