In the press:

An impressive thriller, a story that appeals through its style and atmosphere, but also through the poignant way the story is told, gradually and surely pulling you into a terrible web of intrigue and confrontations. Wim has it hard... He has a daughter, Inge, who lost an eye in an accident and now threatens to lose her remaining eye as well due to an illness. All of this does not help restore the relationship with his wife, which is already not really optimal. Drawing on a current topic from reality, the only salvation in this case seems to be turning to a medicine that exists, but is a pawn in the interests of two companies in the pharmaceutical world. And the financial interests seem to take priority over the health of this girl. He will have to wage a merciless fight against these blind interests, and for this he will have to do more than he would want himself, and above all come into contact with people he would never otherwise have known. Appealing to some, but also quite frightening in other cases. In a captivating and very challenging way, we will be able to follow a particularly clever plot of the unequal struggle people wage in a blind world, literally and figuratively, and the way lost souls can indeed be brought to life... Strongly written, and very certainly an absolute recommendation as a fairly secure faction...

Reviews Bruna.nl

A Flemish thriller about an ordinary weekday Flemish family from the Hageland with a child who, after losing an eye in an accident, threatens to lose her second eye to an incurable condition. But there is hope. A pharma giant, with which dad Wim has good relations, is about to bring eye-saving drops to the market. What the family does not know is that there are pirates on the coast. People with shares in pharma who absolutely do not want to see an expensive blockbuster push the shares enormously high. (...)
Blindeman is quite complex in structure and especially at the beginning of the story it is necessary to stay concentrated. The series of coincidences are sometimes a little too much for me, but the story unfolds nicely so that you as a reader remain glued to the book. (...)

Désirée de Poot in 'De Apotheker'

(...) All this to say that the more or less classic family from Blindeman, which, as the first pages reveal, has already crossed many waters and weathered several storms, will soon be hit by a real flood wave, call it a tsunami. The relative calm that the lines I quoted at the beginning radiate will soon, that is a law in every book, every film, every story, be considerably disturbed. (...) When I read HdJonghe's debut Koppenbergblues a few years ago, about a number of friends and cycling tourists making a kind of Tour of Flanders, he immediately won my sympathy because he lets his cycling tourists pass almost right by my house. Close to where I live, in Rijkevorsel, an important scene from the book even takes place. Koppenbergblues was beautiful and intimate, friends among themselves and here and there some friction. Quite okay for the debut of a late debutant. With Blindeman HdJonghe takes a few big steps forward.

As outlined above, the story is broader and therefore more complex in its design. He cleverly blends past and present, fact and fiction. The dialogues hit the mark, the many characters each have their own personality, and the plot is well thought out and demands a fairly concentrated reading, which is no bad thing. The history is fascinating and relevant. (...) I still see too much mass-produced fare: duo detectives who sometimes have to follow quite implausible storylines, clichés and stereotypes. I'm not saying that Blindeman by HdJonghe discards all of that immediately and for good, but it is undoubtedly one of the best Flemish thrillers I have read this spring. A true paperback writer, then, to borrow a phrase from the fab four.

John Vervoort, reviewer for the Standaard der Letteren, at the presentation of Blindeman in Westerlo

Standaard der Letteren rating: ***

Reading Blindeman, two things stand out immediately: the author takes on a great deal, and chance plays a particularly prominent role in this intrigue, which builds bridges between past and present. For a less talented author this would spell the end of the book's readability, but Herman De Jonghe is a born storyteller who, without coming across as preachy, manages to weave many historical details into his story.
Wim Deferm, a pharmaceutical sales representative, is the paterfamilias of a family with problems. The thirty-year marriage to his wife is showing wear, and moreover Wim feels guilty because their daughter Inge lost the sight in one eye after an accident and risks going completely blind in the future. During a culture trip to Prague, which gives the author the opportunity to dwell at length on the turbulent recent history and the no less hectic distant past of this city, known for its bloody religious conflicts, Wim accidentally comes into contact with a Flemish woman, a historian. She presses a USB stick into his hands with the request to hand it over to a friend in Leuven. The woman later dies under suspicious circumstances. Wim realises that the information passed on to him contains a thesis by the woman in question with secret data about a new medicine that may offer a solution for his daughter's eye disease. The drug, however, becomes the stake in a ruthless struggle between two powerful families in the pharmaceutical world.
At first glance the plot seems rather contrived and unrealistic, but the author manages to make the whole believable and even moving by giving his main character a deeper psychological layering. His faults and weaknesses notwithstanding, he emerges in the story as an upright person who is deeply concerned with the fate of others and who becomes the plaything of powerful opponents for whom material gain outweighs human lives. A thriller that is not free of some moralizing, which does not in any way hinder suspense and surprising twists. De Jonghe has a voice of his own, which rises above the monotonous buzz of Flemish thriller writers.

[Staf Schoeters] 30 April 2012
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