Norma
A novel
(Sprache: Englisch)
From the internationally best-selling author of Purge and When the Doves Disappeared, a spellbinding new novel set in present-day Helsinki, about a young woman with a fantastical secret who is trying to solve the mystery of her mother's death.
When Anita...
When Anita...
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From the internationally best-selling author of Purge and When the Doves Disappeared, a spellbinding new novel set in present-day Helsinki, about a young woman with a fantastical secret who is trying to solve the mystery of her mother's death.When Anita Naakka jumps in front of an oncoming train, her daughter, Norma, is left alone with the secret they have spent their lives hiding: Norma has supernatural hair, sensitive to the slightest changes in her mood--and the moods of those around her--moving of its own accord, corkscrewing when danger is near. And so it is her hair that alerts her, while she talks with a strange man at her mother's funeral, that her mother may not have taken her own life. Setting out to reconstruct Anita's final months--sifting through puzzling cell phone records, bank statements, video files--Norma begins to realize that her mother knew more about her hair's powers than she let on: a sinister truth beyond Norma's imagining. As Sofi Oksanen leads us ever more deeply into Norma's world, weaving together past and present, she gives us a dark family drama that is a searing portrait of both the exploitation of women's bodies and the extremes to which people will go for the sake of beauty.
Lese-Probe zu „Norma “
OneIf everything goes well, by August we can sit back and enjoy good food, sleep, and spa treatments. We can raise a glass to a future in which you receive everything you've never dared to dream. Then my work will be done, and I won't regret the price of your new life one bit.
After the funeral, nothing went back to the way it had been. As Norma fell behind the other guests and slipped onto the road leading to the cemetery gates, she still tried to make herself believe it was possible, though. Her mother wouldn't have been offended that she'd already ordered a taxi, and Norma didn't care about any of the rest of it: relatives she hardly knew, scheming heirs, the fate of the ancestral home of the Naakka family, which was sure to come up over the Karelian pasties and savory sandwich cake as her grandmother interjected observations spun from her brittle memory. Norma would leave the farce behind to try to return to normal life and meet her mother's death head-on. No more avoiding places that reminded Norma of her. No more being late to work. No more taking taxis instead of the metro, and no more bursting into tears each morning as she tore at her hair with a metal-toothed comb. She wouldn't forget to eat or drink enough, and she wouldn't let the life she and her mother had spent so much work building together fall apart. She would prepare for her workday the next morning just as before: she would pick the lint from the back of her blouse and pack her purse with baby oil to tame her curls, diazepam and meclizine to calm her mind and body. Into the bottom of the bag she would toss a travel-size bottle of Elnett hair spray because that was the smell of a normal workday, the choice of women who had their lives in order. That was the kind of woman she intended to be.
After armoring herself for the day to come, she would enter the Sörnäinen Metro Station, melt into the flowing mass of humanity, and allow the escalator to carry her to the platform as on any other
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day. The air current would flap the hem of her skirt, people would browse their phones and free newspapers, and none of them would remember the tragedy that had happened on that same platform. Only she would think of it as she prepared to confront the tension that had dominated her workplace through months of labor negotiations. She would realize that nothing in her life had stopped other than her mother's life.
There was no sign of her taxi. Norma leaned against the cemetery fence and allowed relief to swim into the bubble formed by the benzos and scopolamine. She had survived the funeral. She hadn't spotted deception in anyone's commiseration, or hypocrisy in words of sympathy. She hadn't fainted, vomited, or had a panic attack even though some people had come close enough to hug her. She'd behaved like a model daughter and was finally ready to remove her sunglasses, which had begun to slip down her nose from sweat caused by the heat. Then, just as she was shoving them into her bag, a man she didn't know came up to her to express his condolences. Norma pushed the glasses back on. She didn't want company.
"The others already went that way." Norma motioned toward the restaurant where the reception was being held and pulled the brim of her hat down lower. Instead of leaving, the man extended his hand. Norma ignored the greeting and turned away. She had no interest in interacting with strangers.
But the man didn't give up. He grabbed Norma's hand. "Lambert," the man said. "Max Lambert. One of your mother's old friends."
"I don't remember her ever mentioning you."
The man laughed. "Did you and your mother talk about all your friends? It's been ages. When we were younger, Anita and I had some real adventures together."
Norma pulled her hand away. She could feel the man's grip on her fingers like a stamp pressed into her skin against her will, and he had used the past tense referring to her mother. It sounded like a
There was no sign of her taxi. Norma leaned against the cemetery fence and allowed relief to swim into the bubble formed by the benzos and scopolamine. She had survived the funeral. She hadn't spotted deception in anyone's commiseration, or hypocrisy in words of sympathy. She hadn't fainted, vomited, or had a panic attack even though some people had come close enough to hug her. She'd behaved like a model daughter and was finally ready to remove her sunglasses, which had begun to slip down her nose from sweat caused by the heat. Then, just as she was shoving them into her bag, a man she didn't know came up to her to express his condolences. Norma pushed the glasses back on. She didn't want company.
"The others already went that way." Norma motioned toward the restaurant where the reception was being held and pulled the brim of her hat down lower. Instead of leaving, the man extended his hand. Norma ignored the greeting and turned away. She had no interest in interacting with strangers.
But the man didn't give up. He grabbed Norma's hand. "Lambert," the man said. "Max Lambert. One of your mother's old friends."
"I don't remember her ever mentioning you."
The man laughed. "Did you and your mother talk about all your friends? It's been ages. When we were younger, Anita and I had some real adventures together."
Norma pulled her hand away. She could feel the man's grip on her fingers like a stamp pressed into her skin against her will, and he had used the past tense referring to her mother. It sounded like a
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Autoren-Porträt von Sofi Oksanen
SOFI OKSANEN is a Finnish-Estonian novelist and playwright. She has received numerous prizes for her work, including the Swedish Academy Nordic Prize, the Prix Femina, the Budapest Grand Prize, the European Book Prize, and the Nordic Council Literature Prize. She lives in Helsinki. Translated from the Finnish by Owen Witesman.
Bibliographische Angaben
- Autor: Sofi Oksanen
- 2017, 320 Seiten, Maße: 13,1 x 20,2 cm, Kartoniert (TB), Englisch
- Übersetzer: Owen Frederick Witesman
- Verlag: KNOPF
- ISBN-10: 1524711292
- ISBN-13: 9781524711290
- Erscheinungsdatum: 23.08.2017
Sprache:
Englisch
Pressezitat
International Praise"The reading experience is pure pleasure . . . Norma is not only the story of a young woman and her identity, both perched on the outskirts of the ordinary, but also a suspenseful mystery." -Turun Sanomat (Finland)
"Sofi Oksanen is one of the brightest shining stars in Nordic literature . . . I want to devour Norma whole-and at the same time pause to make it last longer. Oksanen is simply fantastic, and here she is at her best." -Norrköpings Tidningar (Sweden)
"True to herself, Oksanen denounces a globalization that turns human beings into merchandise . . . A hair-raising novel." -Livres Hebdo (France)
"A peculiar and disturbing novel that evokes the universe of filmmaker David Cronenberg . . . Norma impresses as much as it sends shivers down our spines." -Lire (France)
"Norma is an urgent story of beauty ideals, fertility, and women's vulnerability to exploitation . . . There is something tough and inexorable about Sofi Oksanen: she grabs the reader and demands we listen." -VLT (Sweden)
"Hold on tight, because this is the best novel you will read this fall." ★★★★★★ -Femina (Denmark)
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