Grandmother is Swedish

"Nationalnyckeln till Sveriges Flora och Fauna. Fjärilar: Dagfjärilar. Hesperiidae - Nymphalidae".

Such is the forbidding title of this book, published in Sweden and (unfortunately for foreign readers) with text mostly in Swedish. The book is about butterflies and covers all 140 species found in Scandinavia and Finland. All species are illustrated with large, colour pictures of high quality. This makes "Nationalnyckeln. Dagfjärilar" an excellent collectors' item. At least if you like butterflies, or books about them! Incidentally, even the Monarch is included in this work, since a few specimens of this typical American species have been found in Sweden.

But, as I already pointed out, you won't be able to actually read the book. The identification key is bilingual, and there are very short summaries of each species presentation in English. Still, 99% of the text is in Swedish.

If you absolutely want this work, you might as well contact the publishers directly through their bilingual website, also called Nationalnyckeln, to compare their prices and delivery rates with those of Amazon's sellers. They may be better, worse or similar. I don't know.

"Nationalnyckeln. Dagfjärilar" is part of a series, the ultimate aim of which is to illustrate and describe all species of living organisms in Sweden (!). The whole project will probably take decades to complete. Thankfully, Nationalnyckeln is supported by both the Swedish Parliament and the crown princess Victoria. So far, only seven volumes have been published: Butterflies, Moths (Lasiocampidae - Lymantriidae), Moths (Micropterigidae - Psychidae), Longhorn Beetles, Myriapods, Mosses (Buxbaumia - Leucobryum) and Mosses (Anoectangium - Orthodontium). Next in line are two volumes on Hoverflies.

It's a pity that the English sections aren't longer. These books are so well produced, and so nicely illustrated, that they could definitely have become best sellers abroad, despite their restricted geographical ranges. In a sense, this is the Grandmother of all Reference Works.

But it seems Grandmother is Swedish...

Still, this butterfly volume could be a nice collectors' item, and I would also recommend Moths (Lasiocampidae - Lymantriidae) and Longhorn Beetles for such purposes. The other volumes look more boring.