Maria Kjos Fonn

Kinderwhore

Kinderwhore

Charlotte’s mother is always at home, yet hardly ever there. Most of the time she is asleep, heavily medicated in order to remain so. When she is not asleep, she brings home new dads for Charlotte. One of them shows her a glimpse of something else, something better. But too soon, he is replaced by yet another dad.

When Charlotte is 12 something happens, something she cannot possibly take in or process. She starts making use of her mother’s pills, happy to learn that there are ways of shutting off your feelings. She establishes a divide between her body and mind, allowing her to take on different sexual roles, like the sedated, passive Doll or the proactive Machine.

Raw, powerful and important on sexuality, assault and survival.

Nominated for the 2018 Brage Prize, the 2018 P2 Listener’s Prize and the 2018 Natt&Dag Literature Prize

“Many have written well about the brutality of adolescence. But few have done so better than Maria Kjos Fonn. (…) a powerful novel that will stay with the reader for a long time (…) an unusually talented storyteller”.

VG

Kinderwhore is a tough read, but also well narrated, insightful and enlightening. A book about the unfathomable and the real. A novel everyone ought to read.”

Dagbladet
Photo: Tine Poppe

Maria Kjos Fonn (b. 1990) made her debut with the criticaly acclaimed short story collection I Have Never Told Anyone About This in 2014. She was nominated to the Tarjei Vesaas’ Debutant Prize and recieved the Aschehoug Debutant Stipend for her first book. She lives in Oslo and works as a journalist.

Maria Kjos Fonn is one of the participants chosen for NORLA’s development programme for new literary talents “New Voices”, a part of the project of Norway as Guest of Honour at the Frankfurt Book Fair in 2019.