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.
Marcel returns to his grandmother Andrea’s house, hoping to uncover the secrets of the past. He wants to know why he was named after his grand uncle Marcel, Andrea’s brother, who died on the Eastern Front.
'Night Parents' is a swirling mix of intimate night-time conversations, brooding diary excerpts, meaningful flashbacks and scenes filled with slapstick, culminating in a gothic novel complete with sawn-off fingertips and family secrets.
The illustrations demonstrate impressive skill and a steady hand.
JaapLeest
Walter is always falling asleep. It doesn’t matter where he is: at his birthday party, on the seesaw, in the swimming pool. His parents try everything they can think of to wake him up, but nothing works. Until a little dog walks in by accident and licks Walter’s face. A wonderful universe full of magical details.
Charlotte Van den Broeck won her poetical spurs in a similar way to Maud Vanhauwaert, namely onstage. The accompanying familiarity of her name provided her debut ‘Chameleon’ with the necessary impetus. ‘Chameleon’ would appear to be the perfect title for a debut volume of poetry.
A rich, accessible treasure trove of facts and figures
Financial Times
‘Timeline’ is a trip through time, past dinosaurs, Vikings, Aztecs and spaceships. It is an illustrated journey through our world’s culture and events and travels from the Big Bang to the iPod. Peter Goes constructs a continuous line, on which different historical periods make their appearance one by one.
In ‘Mona in Three Acts’ we follow Mona from a nine-year-old girl who loses her mother in a car accident to a thirty-five-year-old woman who watches her beloved sick father die. This is a universal story about why we become who we are.
Right before his death in the 1980s, Stefan Hertmans’ grandfather gave his grandson a few notebooks. For years, Hertmans was too afraid to open them – until he finally did and laid bare some unexpected secrets.
‘Woesten’ recounts a suffocating story full of village gossip about a family in which fate strikes with a heavy hand, leaving no-one unscathed. It portrays a realistic, almost naturalistic image of a typical rural village in the early 20th century and offers a nuanced view of the psychology of intriguing characters.
Two Belgian exiles, both called Tony Hanssen, are seeking themselves in a world that has become too big and too chaotic for everyone. One Tony is a loser with no illusions, the other Tony a high-spirited nerd. Both are hoping for salvation. ‘Fortunate Slaves’ is a pitch-black tragicomedy with unforgettable characters and dialogues, an ingenious plot and a virtuoso style.
Like every year, everyone gathers on the top of the hill. Ant is very happy that it is finally her turn to chair the meeting, in which they will discuss a difficult question. Elephant asks how you know that you love someone.
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.
Maia and her grandmother have a ball whenever they are together. But then Grandma suddenly falls ill and when she wakes up she has lost her words. Far from the realms of cliché, Tine Mortier and Kaatje Vermeire show how a sharp young girl copes with difficult themes like ageing and death.
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.
A playful, touching, and verbally extravagant memoir-novel of grief
Kirkus
'Speechless' is an ‘unadorned account’, an informal, honest testimony of a mother by her son, in which much is in what is not mentioned: good nature, gratitude, endearment, closeness. At the same time, Lanoye reflects on the actual function of writing and the vital importance of language in these circumstances.
Sammy is a little boy with a huge appetite, he feels like eating the biggest, tallest sandwich in the world.
An ode to the creative fantasy of toddlers, who love to convert features of their surroundings into something quite different for a while. This is a look-and-find book full of visual discoveries that will endlessly excite the smallest of children, and indeed their parents.
Old Helena looks back on her youth, the loves she has known, her marriage and the distressing time she experienced in World War I. The topic and style make ‘While the Gods Were Sleeping’ in all respects an exceptional literary experience.
A masterful symbiosis of colour, form and composition
Boekenpauw jury
Based on Hans Christian Andersen’s classic fairy tale, ‘The Secret of the Nightingale’s Throat’ is a literary retelling that will appeal to readers of all ages. In the long line of illustrators who have made pictures to accompany Andersen’s tale, few have managed to catch the emperor’s despair as vividly as Carll Cneut.
The young aristocrat beautifully and convincingly portrayed in this book is Marguerite van Male, a girl of flesh and blood, a wayward, boyish, wild and eccentric child, constantly at odds with her authoritarian father. She cannot be forced to do anything and refuses to be corseted – literally and figuratively – by anyone.
In the middle of the night a million different butterflies fly round the head of Stach, a young elephant. Stach is completely bewildered, but his parents know what he has to do. He must set out in pursuit of the butterflies. On his journey Stach realises that no one sees the butterflies but him.
Alex is a gluttonous little pig. ‘Don’t eat when we’re not eating’, his mother says. Alex is stopped by a monster who eyes him as a tasty morsel, whom he manages to distract with clever tricks. But every monster has a mother, and all mothers are more or less alike. A veritable feast for keen observers.
In this reworking of a medieval story, the magnificent illustrations by Klaas Verplancke bring Reynard vividly to life. Each iconographic image is a genuine masterpiece, full of quirky details that the reader can explore for hours on end.
Fox and Hare live together in the wood, next door to Owl. They love each other and they tease each other and, as befits an inseparable duo, they’re complete opposites. Vanden Heede succeeds in creating unforgettable characters in a fresh and funny style. The story’s so much fun that the readers barely notice the words and sentences are getting longer and longer.
In a forgotten village somewhere in Flanders, a boy lives with his father and three uncles in his grandmother’s house. They’re an ill-mannered and coarse bunch, unpredictable heavy drinkers. Wallowing at the bottom of the social ladder, their lives are a total mess.
A beautiful picture book to get to know all the colours of the rainbow.
Stiftunglesen.de
Since 2004, this loveable little white fish has been part of Guido Van Genechten’s oeuvre. In this first adventure, little white fish goes in search of his mother. Along the way, he meets creatures of all kinds and colours: a red crab, an orange starfish, a yellow snail, a green turtle, a blue whale and a purple octopus.
When she finds her husband dead, Alice does not rush to the phone to call the doctor or her son. She wraps Jules in a plaid, and makes plans for lunch. She is willing to relinquish her husband to death if need be, but not to the outside world. ‘A Day with Mr. Jules’ is a touching, convincing novel about the end of a man’s life: a worthy “sputtering finale of belching steam”.
A talented writer, original and funny, who is definitely one to watch
Le Monde
While working on his thesis, David Van Reybrouck came across the accusation that the Belgian writer and Nobel Prize winner Maurice Maeterlinck had plagiarised from the work of the South African author Eugène Marais. ‘The Plague’ sweeps the reader along in a thrilling literary adventure, which leaves its image on the mind’s eye long after the last page has been turned.
A world that sizzles with activity and teems with life
De Standaard
In 'In the Shadow of the Ark' Anne Provoost takes her inspiration from the Biblical account of the Flood. Re Jana and her family leave the rising water levels of the marshes for the desert where it is rumoured that the largest vessel of all time is being built. The writer enthrals with a chronicle of quickly changing events in what is nevertheless a calmly developing story, with vivid scenes that appeal strongly to the imagination.
Moeyaert proves without doubt that even a happy childhood can be a goldmine for a writer.
De Volkskrant
Bart Moeyaert is the youngest of seven brothers. His early years in his native city of Bruges were particularly happy and furnished him with an abundance of material for this much-praised autobiographical collection. In the forty-nine stories, humour, warmth and a sense of solidarity are prominent, but between the lines lies a far richer spectrum of emotions.
A rabbit family that you instantly adopt as your own
De Leeswelp
Ricky Rabbit is different from the other rabbits: his right ear droops, while his left ear stands straight up. Whatever he does, the other rabbits make fun of him. In the end, his humour earns him a place in the group as the entertainer.
Aspe’s characters are very complex, his plot excellent.
Vrij Nederland
‘From Bruges with Love’ is the third instalment in the popular thriller series around Inspector Van In. By touching on issues such as paedophilia, corruption and blackmail, the narrative provides a critique of the cover-ups that have rocked Belgian politics.
A particularly complex plot that intrigues, surprises and fascinates until the very last page
De Morgen
‘The Midas Murders’is the second in the popular crime series around the eccentric Inspector Pieter Van In. The title refers to King Midas, the Greek mythological figure who had the ability to turn everything he touched into gold. Aspe demonstrates that in both ancient Greece and present-day Belgium profiteering can lead to tragedy.
An original and particularly funny novel full of amusing melancholy
NRC Handelsblad
Lanoye has managed to deal with the banal subject of a boy's unrequited love in a thoroughly unbanal way. This auto-biographical story retains its power because it is imbedded in the hilarious background of a childhood in Flanders around 1970. With his rich, melancholic style Lanoye has been able to create a modest monument for his first `touching' romance.
Ingeniously constructed and imaginative tales arouse emotion and a sense of tragedy.
Het Parool
The four stories in this debut provide a caricatured but equally nostalgic and loving impression of ‘La Flandre Profonde’ and demonstrate Lanoye’s feel for humour and style. Although the main character from ‘A Butcher’s Son with Glasses’ resembles the author in many ways, these stories are nevertheless loaded with surrealism, wit and crackling irony.
Within the space of three days, six people are murdered. All the evidence leads to Angelo Ledda, a ruthless hitman who suffers from progressive memory loss. A well-researched crime novel by the 'Godfather of the Flemish thriller'.
One of the landmark European novels of the post-war era
J.M. Coetzee
This Bildungsroman is also a social document about political and social misfortune in Flanders before, during, and after World War II. The novel has continued to be a bestseller for many years and has been translated into numerous languages.
Journalist Freek Groenevelt’s life is thoroughly shaken up by a series of surprising events that seem to all revolve around an individual called Joachim Stiller. The novel is a textbook example of the magic realist style in which reality is interwoven with surreal elements: nothing is exactly as it seems.
'The Duck Hunt' is the story of a Flemish farming family during World War II. The centre of the family is the widow Metsiers, who is called ‘the Mother’. Years ago, she murdered her husband, together with her lover Mon Verkindere, with whom she now lives on the farmstead. She has two children: Ana and Bennie. Bennie and his half-sister are driven ever closer together, until a love grows between them for which Bennie eventually has to pay the price.
The most beautiful ode to rural life ever written in the Dutch language
De Standaard
Farmer Wortel recounts the story of his life: his connection to the soil which he works, his relationship with God (and pastor), and his natural acceptance of his and his family’s fate. The story, written in the first person, echoes with this simple man’s love for life.
One can speak of Elsschot’s oeuvre as great European literature
Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung
Since its publication in English, ‘Cheese’ has conquered the world with translations in more than 30 languages. The novella deals with an episode in the life of Frans Laarmans, a clerk who is suddenly made chief representative of a Dutch cheese company. ‘Cheese’ is a satire of the business world and the perfect vehicle for Elsschot’s dry humorous style. In a brilliant evocation of the thirties, it depicts a world full of smart operators and failed businessmen.
An ‘ode to life’ written after a moral and physical crisis, ‘Pallieter’ was warmly received as an antidote to the misery of World War I in occupied Belgium. ‘Pallieter’ is a portrait of Flemish rural life in which there is never a cheerless moment.
