If you travelled to Pajala (PIE-eh-lah), a tiny town in far northern Sweden, you would meet people who sound a little like this: (7918- Play up full for about five seconds then fade under next bit of intro. Tape is :13secs) This is Mikael (Michael) Niemi (nee-EM-ee) reading from his novel "Popular Music from Vittula." (VEE-too-luh) It's a coming of age story set in Pajala (PIE-eh-lah) in the 1960's. The book has been a huge success, proclaimed by one Swedish critic as "a masterpiece that vibrates life, humor and a cutting pain". It won the best book award in Sweden in the year 2000. Now it's being translated and published in many languages around the world. It's all a bit of a surprise for Niemi (nee-EM-ee) who says Pajala (PIE-eh-lah) is a fundamentally boring place. The winter is long, and the people terse and slightly depressed. He told Minnesota Public Radio's Euan Kerr that it's so remote that until the book came out most Swedes didn't even know where it is.