A haunting exploration of post-war identity, possession

SHORTLISTED for the Booker Prize in 2024 and now winner of the Women's Prize in 2025, Yael van der Wouden’s debut novel, The SafeKeep, brings an intense, lyrical voice to our shelves.

- BERYL EICHENBERGER

A house is the main character, and, as the story unfolds, what is ownership? A broken piece of crockery found in the garden alerts the very unlikeable protagonist, Isabel, 27 years old, unmarried, repressed, resentful, angry, to a broken plate... but the set with the blue hares, as she knows it, is complete. It is this small fragment that sets the scene. In the summer of 1961 Isabel is living in the family home in rural Netherlands.

The war is over, the country recovering, but it will take more than 15 years to repair a country’s psyche.