Flanders Literature helps publishers and festival organisers find that one particular title or author that is the perfect fit for their list or audience. So take a good look around, we present a selection of the finest literature from Flanders. If you like what you see, please get in touch with us for further information.
Moonie is staring at a vase one day when thirteen tiny blue deer come trotting out of it. The deer do not turn out to be friends in whom Moonie can confide, and they don’t come when she calls. Van de Vendel presents a convincing picture of the inner world and conversations of children. De Leeuw employs a minimal background and simple lines and makes very effective use of colour.
The early 1960s. Joris is ten and likes nothing more than playing war in the dunes. Inside his dad’s old army trunk, he finds a mysterious photograph of his parents with a young man. Who is he? And what does he have to do with the night of 2 April?
Marita de Sterck gives fairy tales back their primal power.
De Morgen
In ‘Beast in Bed’, tales like Rapunzel and Snow White are restored to their former glory, giving them back their emotional and literary force and their fierce energy. A must-read for anyone who loves pure folk tales.
Thomas is dead, but three people can still see him: his inconsolable mother, his beloved Orphee and his dying grandfather. De Leeuw writes highly sensitive, keen prose with poignant images, and is painfully honest in showing that damaged, lonely people can be unreasonable and unkind, and that love can be an immense burden.
No better soundtrack for a political and cultural history of the twentieth century than jazz. In 'Rebellious Rhythms' Matthijs de Ridder starts on a hazardous search through an age of jazz and jazzy literature.
An eye-opener for everyone who thinks he/she is normal and that only others suffer psychologically.
Yves Desmet
In 'Borderline Times'Dirk De Wachter describes how the nine symptoms of Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) are present in all of us. His diagnosis upon observing our society is: ‘borderline’.
Few authors combine that much knowledge with such a pleasant and accessible style.
Erik Lindner
Using images and texts taken from literature, philosophy, art, the internet and popular culture, Piet Joostens goes in search of the figure of the friend and how it relates to friendship.
An epic story about life and identity that is hard to put down
De Morgen
Kaspar Hauser has intrigued historians, writers and artists for centuries. Kristien Dieltiens has constructed a masterful novel around his life. 'Cellar Child' begins with an impressive scene that grips the reader and refuses to let go until the breathtaking finale 480 pages later.
A complex but extremely clear and compelling novel about the recent history of Rwanda
De Morgen
‘A Thousand Hills’ is a rich book, written with highly imaginative touch, that reveals the beauty and the tragedy of the land of a thousand hills. It steers a course between novel, history, anthropological study, and news report. ‘A Thousand Hills’ is a provocative novel and has the power to fuel discussions that still take place about Rwanda internationally.
A gripping and authentic tale of love, friendship, grief and loss
NBD Biblion
Eppo is taking a trip. Hitchhiking to France he is picked up by Tabby, who has her own reasons for leaving home. Tabby talks nineteen to the dozen; Eppo is an introvert. Through his eyes we join them on their journey, which has more to do with what lies behind them than with where they are going.
'Little Paradise’ is a tale of longing, of family, of breaking free and wanting to belong and the difficult balance of all those elements. But it is also full of adventure, with storylines that cleverly twist and turn and an action-packed climax.
Theatre is rarely as disarming, as sophisticated, as urgent as this.
Jury report Theaterfestival
Krenz symbolises a life lived as a runner-up, waiting on the sidelines for one’s moment – a moment that never lives up to long-held expectations. Willem de Wolf links Krenz’s story to his own family history. In this smart, sharp and funny text, De Wolf dissects the frustrations and loneliness that lie behind ambition.
A clever thriller: exciting, with a well-rounded plot and very recognisable
NDB Biblion
When union official Martin looks away in terror from three youths who are spraying graffiti on a night train and then attack an elderly gentleman who says something about it, he finds himself in a moral quandary. Nobody notices him, he doesn’t have a mobile phone and the victim doesn’t seem to be in a bad way. Enough reasons for Martin not to call the police.
The work of a highly imaginative mind, full of scintillating, poetic language
Tzum
The feigned cheerfulness of the family, the ambiguity of the characters’ banal behaviour and the gathering storm all suggest something terrible is about to happen. Combined with the suggestive style of the book, this ominous tension keeps the reader spellbound.
Steven Dupré has given his unbridled imagination free rein.
Actuabd.com
Steven Dupré is a craftsman: his assured, very natural drawing style is of the highest quality. In addition, as a scriptwriter the author has mastered the art of taking his readers with him to a parallel universe, by means of subtle, profound stories.
Murphy is an anti-hero: an astronaut who continually has bad luck. In his miserable space adventures, Charlotte Dumortier is able to experiment fully with colour, framing and page division. The young artist pulls out all the stops. She lets fly with lay-out, rhythm and colouring.
Flawless stories like these haven’t appeared in Flanders for a long time.
Knack
‘Barely Body’ is a collection of five classic existentialist tales about people who are alive only in the physical sense. Their dreams are mercilessly eroded by the ravages of time, turning them into pale shadows of who they used to be.
In the dead calm literature in Flanders, the most remarkable debutant in years
Humo
With the skill of a pathologist, in 'Waakzaam' (Vigilant, 2011), he dissects the ugliness of hedonism and the aberration of egotism using drawn-out tirades in which the metre jerks and judders, and in which he makes a conscious choice to use ugly, often composite words full of hard consonants, like something posted by a spammer on an Internet forum.
In ‘The Trip to Inframundo’ (2011) Peter Holvoet-Hanssen presents a challenging selection of poems taken from these five collections, and by altering the original chronology and combining poems in new ways he constructs a completely fresh collection in which he follows trails that emerge before fading away
Lamrabet peels off skin after skin of the onion and does so in a magnificently compelling style ****
De Volkskrant
Moncif tells his story hiding under a table in the mortuary waiting for the guard to leave the building. His wife left him because he had distanced himself from Muslim culture and now that his brother has died in a car accident he has descended into deep despair.
About this poetry, we will not run out of themes to talk about
De Volkskrant
Paul Demets' poetry is very much aware that language constitutes both the individual and the society in which a human being lives. His poetry questions the social and ethical dimensions, and resulting dilemmas, of modern society and time. In a world without fixed points to hold onto, the search for the self and the longing for interaction with the other ground Demets’ poems.
A tender story offering a glimmer of hope for all the frightened little outsiders
De Leeswelp
Telemarcus cannot or dares not dive. One day, when all the young pigeons have to take a gruelling diving test to receive their diploma, he anxiously awaits his turn. With his soft-hued illustrations incorporating old photographs, Alain Verster evokes a nostalgic atmosphere. A highly successful and amazingly illustrated book about the fear of failure.
Passion, brotherhood and betrayal make this book roar like the sea.
NRC Handelsblad
Nelen depicts wonderful and believable characters with her strong sense of atmosphere and observation. In her poetic style, which leaves a lot unsaid, she evokes a dreamlike, misty atmosphere, filled with vague longing, masterfully succeeding in creating an exciting story set against a fascinating historical background.
Without doubt thé Dutch-language novel of the year. It is the most beautiful and overwhelming First World War epic of Flemish literature to date.
Knack
This is a novel about lies, illusions and make-believe. In an excellently documented portrait of an era, Brijs exposes the gulf between the excitement about the war and the appalling reality of it, depicted in strong dramatic scenes.
She succeeds in making the first king of the Belgians a man of flesh and blood.
Erwin Mortier
Based on Leopold’s private letters, Gita Deneckere paints a portrait of a melancholy ruler who managed like no other to weave together the personal and the political. Through his eyes she examines the history of Europe in a period of change.
Fluid and clear, the author’s approach is didactic yet never pedantic.
De Standaard
The author continually speaks to his readers and integrates their responses into his text by concurring with or contradicting them. This rhetorical strategy makes what he writes all the more convincing.
An ambitious and harmonious get together of touristic guide, history lesson and good stories.
Radio 1
Bart Van Loo’s declaration of intent opens a highly original and enjoyable alternative history of France in the light of French chansons. By combining an erudite knowledge of French music and historical facts Bart Van Loo constructs fascinating and unexpected connections.
The theme that unites all the essays in ‘The Mobilization of Arcadia’ is our romantic and Christian longing for Arcadia, an imaginary place that acquired a new meaning with the arrival of modernity.
An intimate story, written with wonderful tautness
De Morgen
‘The Milky Way’ is an intimate story about growing pains, absence and transience. It is also about the thin line between fiction and reality, and inventing stories as a barrier against things that are too big and too scary. About wanting to stay small, but having to grow up.
Brothers Harry and Huibert, 'so sour even the flowers on their wallpaper are wilting’, appear to be pretty content with their stagnant lives: day after day they soak their dentures in vinegar and breakfast on pickled herring and nettle tea. That routine is disrupted when they receive a letter that turns their lives upside-down and uncovers a dark secret from their not-so-colourless past.
‘SGF’ is a comic about comics, it’s satire, it’s a Freudian manifestation of the It, it’s a load of nonsense, it’s a declaration of love for pulp culture, but above all, it’s rock & roll.
Adam believes it’s his job to keep everything in the Garden of Eden, where he lives with Eve, in good order – to curb nature, that is. Eve is beginning to sigh more and she’s taking less pleasure in life. Keen to do something about it, Adam yields to Eve’s fatigue and stops his maintenance work. From then on, everything is allowed to grow rampant.
Quality entertainment with characters that leave a lasting impression
De Standaard
Alex is a hero in the police force; Penny is an ex-whore and the leader of a group of militant prostitutes who have violently freed themselves from their pimps andanyone else who encroaches on their space. Once they were lovers, now they are perfect enemies in the smallest battlefield ever.
Heart-breaking – right down to the square centimetre. Left me breathless and moved to tears.
Cutting Edge
A novel that confirms that loving, even at a distance, gives life great quality. Bogaert often works with stilled, intimate scenes, very precisely drawn miniatures full of fine details that attest to an extraordinary gift of observation. His seemingly modest prose shimmers with sensibility and emotion, with melancholy and muted tragedy.
Peter Theunynck’s body houses twin souls: a virtuoso aesthete and a contrary troublemaker; a mild melancholic and a snappy hero of the resistance; a whistling nature-lover and a protesting city-dweller.
Insingel’s language has the grim structure of a machinery, but when carefully read that machinery displays emotions
NRC Handelsblad
Language is at the heart of Mark Insingel’s oeuvre. His writing is based on an idiosyncratic, creative relationship with existing forms of expression such as slogans, traditional proverbs and idiomatic phrases, which he undermines and in his unique way playfully and unexpectedly combines in varying settings to eke out new meanings.
In his texts Gruwez is looking for the boundaries of what is considered as decent or fitting
Poëziekrant
Gruwez' work does not shy away from heavy emotions. His poetry is a plea for sensuality, daring to be different, for emotional courage, for lyricism. In ‘Wardrobe’ he made a selection out of forty years of poetry writing. It is a strong and severe choice that presents a perfect introduction to the poetical work of Luuk Gruwez.
In Janssen’s extravagant visual idiom, Africa is an intoxicating place.
NRC Handelsblad
This picaresque story about Bakamé and Mpyisi, which contains plenty of sex and black humour, is a perfect illustration of what drives people and can make them so unappealing. The hare’s cunning, lust and egocentrism are at the centre of this story, but other characters’ traits are also explored in depth. A satirical look at a world in which desire, violence and magic are inextricably entwined.
Dazzling etchings that intrigue to the very last page
De Morgen
One day, the circus of Dottore Fausto arrives in Tito’s village. An impressive figure enters the ring and everything changes through his presence. Isabelle Vandenabeele’s black and red woodcuts are dazzling, magnificent, rough, simple, expressive and exuberant.
A book and a study of a kind of which there are all too few
De Standaard
‘Peace Be With You, Sister’ is the story of Muriel Degauque, a Belgian who became the first and only Western woman to carry out a suicide attack. She drove her white Mercedes from Brussels to Baghdad in order to blow herself up in the name of Allah.
A supremely readable book on Darwin’s field notebooks, pocket notebooks, diaries, letters, and sketches.
NRC Handelsblad
In a vivid way, Dirk Van Hulle tells us how Darwin was strongly influenced by poets and writers from the Romantic period: Wordsworth, Shelley, and through them, Milton and his 'Paradise lost'.
Rosie goes to live in a new flat with her mother and quickly makes friends with the boy on the floor above, Moussa, and with the elderly Mrs Hemelrijk. Together they have a fun adventure on the roof, which has a great view over the city.
For ‘The Virgin Marino’Petry was inspired by a notorious murder case in Germany in which a man was castrated, killed and eaten by his friend at his own request. His power lies in a combination of extremely precise, carefully considered formulations and astounding stylistic elegance.
A real page-turner with innumerable surprising and thrilling twists
De Standaard
Nita Nomansdaughter is a late 16th century cutpurse. At the age of thirteen, she is sold to a travelling apothecary who swindles market-goers. Nita becomes proficient at her trade, until one day she is caught and sentenced to the gallows.
Fascinating depiction of the evolution of society through one family [...] a stylistic crown jewel.
JURY REPORT, LIBRIS LITERATURE PRIZE
'Small Days' is a unique poetic diary of daily life, evoking affection and admiration in equal measure. How wonderful it must be for his children to see their childhood recorded so well by a loving author father! But this personal experience is made universally recognisable and Dewulf’s prose is striking for its subdued tone, its beautiful metaphors and its natural lyricism.
In this exploration of a murderer’s motives, Bram Dehouck manages to capture the audience’s attention from beginning to end, culminating in a nail-biting, tragic finale that will resonate with the reader for a long time.
When it comes to style, theme and narrative power, Olyslaegers proves to be a worthy bastard son of the great Hugo Claus. ‘We’ is a gift to Dutch-language literature.
Humo
Fast-paced and perceptive, ‘We’ is a many-layered book written in a natural, poetic language. It is a portrait of a man who is horrified by the pressure exerted by his environment as well as an incisive portrait of both the 1970s and today.
Little Man and Little Woman are longing for a child. But before they make one, Little Man and Little Woman start to fantasize about what their child should look like. However, when their baby is finally born, he is not at all how his parents imagined him to be. Still, he is just right…
This book is worth three literary Michelin stars. It is a masterpiece.
Liberales
This is a gripping novel about how chance and random pieces of information, transformed into poignant memories and delusions, can have a lasting impact on somebody’s life. Vanderstraeten creates an engaging human drama about a guilt-ridden man and manages to sustain the tension up until the surprising conclusion.
