“What Drives Pekka Wall?”

This is my first real attempt to peel back the layers and share a little about where my characters actually come from. And if we’re going to start anywhere, it really has to be Pekka Wall—the name on the spine, the protagonist, the trouble magnet, and, let’s be honest, the beating heart (and sometimes the ulcer) of the whole series.

I’ve now written the first three books, with three more still to come. The series evolved slowly, starting as a weather front moving in: the arc in my mind was always clear—Pekka’s journey from the lonely margins of childhood, through a not-quite-glamorous adulthood of minor fame and moderate money, only to arrive at a late middle age where everything he’s collected suddenly seems to weigh him down rather than lift him up.

The 360 degrees of the story – but the blurry close-up of Pekka

What’s amusing is that whilst I always knew the basic structure—the plotlines looping through my head in a kind of panoramic cinema—the main character himself took his sweet time coming into focus. Pekka Wall, at first, was little more than a shadow behind frosted glass. So I started to write my way around him: snippets, flashbacks, notes on his childhood. Most of these ended up on the cutting room floor, but a handful will form the backbone of the final book—the one about Pekka’s earliest years, aged six to thirteen. Not a coming-of-age tale, but a lens on the world as seen by a child named Pekka.

Here’s what I discovered, writing into the unknown: for all the easy assumptions about identity, sexuality, or relationships (Pekka is a gay man, yes, but that’s not the engine of his story), none of that ever truly drove him. His sexuality is present—he made peace with it during those strange, lonely school years—but it was never the obstacle, nor the force that kept him awake at night.

The real driving force that kept Pekka moving forward

No, the real driver is much older and rawer: his hatred of injustice. From his earliest days, Pekka was on the outside, bullied and marginalised, not just feeling the sting of unfairness but coming to absolutely despise it. Witnessing a teacher reward the wrong child for something he didn’t do—these small, painful moments calcified a deep sense of justice in Pekka. He grew up with a built-in allergy to authority for authority’s sake, rules that serve only to keep people in line, and any system that prizes conformity over authenticity.

If Pekka ever had to choose between belonging (at the price of self-erasure) or solitude (with its cold but honest freedom), he would always pick the latter. That choice shapes his whole life: a loner by default, but not by desire. His hunger for connection never really fades, even as he ages into someone the world would call a “success”.

Love, in the ordinary sense, is slippery for Pekka. His connection to Mikael Långberg wasn’t romance; it was worship. He’s a born editor, the midwife to other people’s creative brilliance. When he meets Trambolini, he doesn’t just shape the work—he makes Trambolini a world-class writer. It’s in these relationships, these acts of quiet service and creative improvement, that Pekka finds his most authentic self.

The legacy became an aching heart

But there is a cost. As sixty looms, Pekka faces the void: fame and accomplishment, but no legacy, no one to share the story with. Legacy requires people, and loneliness, once just background static, starts to ache. It’s here, in the emptiness, that a second profound relationship arrives—Tuomas, who brings not just words and creativity but vulnerability, the acceptance that everyone, even Pekka, needs someone to help them grow into their own humanity.

What drives Pekka Wall, then? Not love or lust or even a hunger for belonging—at least not in any simple way. His true north is a fierce refusal to look away from injustice, a bone-deep need to right the small wrongs of the world, and to stand beside the marginalised, the overlooked, the ones who never quite fit. That’s the story under the story.

Now you know: for Pekka Wall, the engine is never romance, never easy acceptance. It’s the unrelenting fight against injustice and the unglamorous work of standing beside those who have no one else.

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Thanks for reading. Perhaps next time, I’ll risk pulling back the curtain on another character—if you’re still curious to come along.

Cheers

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