Literature and Fiction · Hardback

Xiania 2 - Ada

Lotta Elstad

Ada is born around 1880. There is no birth certificate. Her father is a fisherman and gambler. Her mother is absent and almost always pregnant. Most of her children die, and she herself dies in labor when Ada is fifteen. Ada is the lone witness to this brutal event, and the one who has to deliver her bloodied, orphaned little brother.

Soon after, her father loses Ada's hand in a card game. On her honeymoon, she runs away and flees to Xiania. She finds lodging and works as a cleaning lady at an “establishment”, fronted by a delicatessen, and run by a certain Madame Josefine. Ada begins to kick prostitutes in the stomach as an abortion method. Her services are high in demand.

This is the start of a journey that ends with Ada inheriting the delicatessen, getting rid of the anchovy smell and taking the alias Madam Zavarella. She opens a hat shop on the ground floor – and an abortion clinic in the basement. The story ends in 1923, when a young girl, Klara, knocks her door.

Xiania 2: Ada is a raw tale of a run-down part of town, of life and death, of drinking and sex, of women’s health and abortion, of underpaid drudges and colourful procuresses, thieves, smugglers and circus folk.

«Lotta Elstad balances well here, between serious political morals and playful entertainment. [...] It breathes and thumps, and sizzles and smells – of Elstad's Kristiania.»Dagsavisen

«There's not a lot of fun in the Xiania series, but Lotta Elstad can certainly write.»Stavanger aftenblad, five/six stars