– Thinking how lucky you are – VG

– I forgot it the day I had my stroke – and didn’t realize it until I was in recovery and sat down with some other smoker: Fresh, I smoke!

But then it was already done. From smoking 30-40 a day for over 40 years, I’ve become a non-smoker. From the moment she had a stroke on July 4, 2019.

background: Rajdy suffered a stroke

– But I sat on the bench with smokers every day for the six weeks I was in rehab. I think it was smart because then I learned not to be tempted, and there were no issues with that when I went back to everyday life. But I like to get a little closer if I meet smokers on the street, just to draw a little. Hehe, I love that scent.

But then: There is no question of starting over. Because smoking really made the fight easier.

She said it before, then she said:

– I was in Death Square.

– But I never felt afraid when I was in the middle of it. I was more indifferent to everything. In fact, it’s good to think now, that when I got sick I could die, and let go of everything. I imagined I would be so scared the day I would grow old and die. Rajdi says now, I know I won’t be either, this is a relief.

But she says she was completely outside after the battle: She had to help with everything, lost a lot of language, swerved in her body — and had “strange thoughts,” she says.

– I was outside, yes. at least. I could suddenly think: Where am I going? Before I came, yes, I am here and this has happened.

The family was worried, and the son and daughter-in-law told her they weren’t sure how this would happen.

– But then he started climbing to the top. With a lot of training and many meetings with all potential therapists. It was like everything from Kim’s play to strength training.

In the middle of it all, she was publishing the book the daughter”, the sixth and final volume of the bestselling series on the Neshov people.

And when we talk about this, tears start to roll.

– Hof, I’m just thinking how lucky I was. I think of others I’ve met in rehab, many of whom are still in wheelchairs. Whereas I could release a book that same fall and meet the audience again – and everyone cried. Me too. And yes, I realize I’m the billionth person who throws that joke. She told me that the blow made me move more easily and wiped her tears:

– Oh my goodness, it’s good to get away with this now – before I meet the audience at Deichmann afterwards.

Because that’s why it’s in Oslo. It comes this week with her new novel “The Heartbreaker”. A stand-alone novel about a mother and her adult son who still live at home. The mother has long ceased to believe that there is hope for the son – and sacrifices everything for him.

– I may write here a little for all the mothers who struggle with having adult sons living in the house. Lying in the room until 4pm, just being online and doing nothing. Then you have to take action.

– Just get rid of them! Ragdi says you are only doing them harm, because they end up with these men’s lives going too, they can’t do anything with their lives.

It is clear in one thing:

– Yes, I know I have a son – and many now believe that this is based on their own experiences. But this is not the case. I thought about turning the character into a daughter just to avoid it, but it didn’t work: because that doesn’t happen with girls.

The idea for the book came to her many years ago – in a nightclub over some night food.

– I spoke to a woman who told me that she believed that her son had been beaten and that he was going to die. It was such a dramatic story, I absorbed every word and every nuance – and knew I had to use this. Because something very different was the cause of the son’s condition, and I can’t say more than that – because it would ruin the readers, says Rajdi.

We met her at her home away from home: Bristol in Oslo. She also says it’s a relief, because when she announced her transfer to King Hotel publisher Peter Stordalen Stordalen last year, she thought she had to stay at The Thief.

– I don’t know what Peter thinks about it, but to me it was almost a requirement. It might have been a little off, but I was so happy when it worked.

The only thing I’ve noticed from the fallout after the fight now is that she sometimes forgets words.

– But that only happens when I’m talking. Oddly enough, I don’t forget when I write, and then all the words come out right away. Rajdi, after 33 years as a writer, is what has been called in me.

She has already written on both of them bleeding ulcer And pelvic fracture While working on the novel.

– Yes, it often affected health. I also think the battle of 2019 came about because I totally exhausted myself with the sixth volume in the Berlinerpoplene series. But writing this time it was a dream.

– Because when the aura came, I found a peace I had not already had earlier in my life. I loved Corona time, if I may say so.

New life, new publisher, new book, new tender. But do not believe for a moment that there will be a new man.

– No, my God, says Ann B. Ragdi – behind which there are three marriages.

– I’ve been married three times for nearly 20 years, and it’s totally out of the question that I’ll end up there again.

– Why?

– No, if I were to find a man now, it must be a man between 60 and 65 years old. Do you think I can handle it?

– Let’s go?

– No! I can not afford it. For men between 60 and 65, they will soon be 70 and they will get sick, and I have more than enough to get old and get sick myself.