'Ada, or Joy' is a new translation of Vladimir Nabokov's novel 'Ada or Ardor' into Russian. In it, the reader will find prose already familiar to him from other books by Nabokov, which is distinguished by exquisite imagery, visibility, and appeal. It transforms reality, wittily mixing familiar elements with each other, and as a result, we are presented with a detailed recreated chimera world - a wonderful combination of vaguely recognizable objects and phenomena.

Antiterra is a fabulous parallel world where the events of our history play out as in a distorted mirror, and only seers and madmen know about the real Earth. In this world lives the family whose history Nabokov traces for more than a hundred years. As a result of an extramarital affair between Demon Wine and Marina Durmanova, two gifted and very unusual children are born: Ada and Van. They are destined to stop the passage of time: because of their forbidden love, an ancient and famous family line will be interrupted.

In this novel, Nabokov creates a grandiose labyrinth, a multi-tiered structure, he plays with names, with languages, with the conventions of the genre, with history. He weaves a complex web of associations that originate in a huge layer of transatlantic culture. America, Russia, myths and religions, great literary and artistic works, painting, architecture, historical events. From all this consists the grandiose puzzle of the novel, which is the reader’s task to assemble.