'Suspicions, A dark thriller about secrets and disappearances. After a divorce, Hugo tries to build a new life in Groendaal as a student counsellor. At first he succeeds, until a bomb threat turns the school upside down. Silence surrounds a missing girl, and a maths teacher seems to get away with misconduct. Hugo suspects that student Sofie knows more, but then she vanishes without a trace. Twenty years later, a trip to Sarajevo reveals the hidden truths. Sober in style, with a lot of Flemish language use.
Herman De Jonghe (Temse, 1941) is a Belgian writer and teacher. He has written several books.'
NBD Biblion review
I want to thank you warmly for the beautiful hours you gave me with “Vermoedens”. A few days ago I read the last part, and tears came to my eyes at the ending. Brilliantly written, and you gave me hours of pleasure. Congratulations!
(A good friend)
Herman De Jonghe has repeatedly proven that he is a master at building extraordinary tension out of the everyday.
In ‘Vermoedens’ he once again shows how skilfully he writes realistic dialogues between ordinary people. In his newest book, these are the colleagues in the staff room of a secondary school. Very recognisable for those who sit or have sat at such a table professionally, and at the same time an eye-opener for those unfamiliar with the environment. De Jonghe depicts them with an expert eye and dry wit: ‘We had a lot of prophets at school’, when a teacher once again says: ‘I predicted this ages ago.’
Gradually the reader learns more about the search of protagonist Hugo Persoons: a girl disappeared from school and from her parental home. Persoons finds traces, becomes convinced of a cover-up operation, and fixates on what he believes happened and who was involved.
As we read on, we learn more about Persoons’ past and present, but at the same time the attentive reader also develops a suspicion of depths and shadow sides in his character. I deliberately write ‘a suspicion grows’ because the book develops this subtly and intelligently.
The places the story takes us play a defining role in the atmosphere: an overgrown patch of woods near the school, a suburb of Sarajevo, an obscure street in Zagreb…
I read the book in three sessions, and the last one ended in the middle of the night because I simply could not put it down. And yes, while reading you occasionally hold your breath.
I did wonder, though, whether it is inherent to the thriller genre that an author sometimes takes shortcuts with plot explanations to heighten the tension?
The chronological structure of the book is such that the reader is not taken by the hand and feels obliged to keep up.
You will not find great wisdom to take with you through life in ‘Vermoedens’, but you will find a (sus)pensful reading experience and a writing style in which the paragraphs and pages melt away pleasantly. On several pages of my copy, sentences are marked that I would like to reread.
‘Nothing is as eerie as an empty school, the kind of silence that then hangs in the corridors and stairwells. The echoes of the daily noise, the shouting and laughing, seep from the walls and drift around, but now they have shrunk to moans. There is a lot of suffering in the walls.’
Plot: ***
Character development: ****
Writing style: ****
(Diane De Bruyn)
A CRIME NOVEL TO MAKE THE WINTER EVENINGS LESS DARK
TO BE
++ ‘The house is even smaller than mine and poorly maintained. Windows without paint, only glass, the gutter desperately clings to the roof. He rents it for a small sum from his grandparents’ ++
Original title: Vermoedens
ISBN: 978 94 626 6724 2
Published by: Uitgeverij Schrijverspunt
Pages: 233
Translation:
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐, 1⁄2 ⭐
The Flemish author Herman De Jonghe worked in education until 2002. He held various positions there and ended his working life as a school principal. After that, it took until 2008 before he debuted with Koppenbergblues. Several books followed from his hand, including Ondergrond, which was nominated for the Flemish Hercule Poirot Prize.
Because his life was largely devoted to teaching young people as a teacher, it is not so surprising that a work of his appears that has education as its common thread. He knows the ins and outs of the education world like no other, without saying that what happens in his latest release ‘Vermoedens’ can serve as a norm for education.
When Hugo Persoons is unlucky in his life for a moment, he leaves the profession of electrician and, on the advice of a good acquaintance, becomes a lateral entrant into education. The former electrician has no teacher training but can start working as a study master. That happens at the Kofi Annan Institute in Groendaal, near Turnhout.
When a bomb threat unexpectedly comes into the school, there is of course a major alarm and an investigation is carried out for explosives. The subsequent search turns up nothing and shortly afterward the electricity of the entire school fails. Hugo, an electrician by trade, goes to investigate, and when there is nothing wrong above ground, he descends one floor. There he finds not only the cause of the outage but his attention is also drawn to a photo of a girl who disappeared from Groendaal. It turns out to be Vicky Kràlikovà, who vanished without a trace in 1999. The
disappearance was never solved, and after reading a lot of information, Hugo has a mission...
++ ‘I just ordered something and got a mountain of meat, sausage, minced meat, everything mixed together, enough fat to grease all the hinges in my house, and half-baked fries. I couldn't even finish half of it, I was also too nervous’ ++
The storyline develops entirely through Hugo Persoons, who records every step he takes in the first person. The reader soon learns that he has separated from Carine and, after a short time living in Groendaal
, begins a relationship with Sara Weyns. His investigation into the missing Vicky brings him into contact with Sofie 't Kind. He quietly admires the 18-year-old young woman, but then it turns out she too has unexpectedly vanished without a trace, five years after the disappearance of Vicky. When, after a break-in at his house, the papers he had found about Vicky disappear, he is certain that the path he has taken is the right one and continues his investigation, but he becomes more cautious.
The story starts slowly and remains so for a long time. This is because the author does not position the characters directly, but does so where it will matter in the story.
To absorb the story properly, De Jonghe does demand the full attention of his readers. The chronology is not clearly defined, and although the important years are mentioned in the story, it is up to the reader to create a kind of timeline in their mind. Some readers will take this on as a welcome challenge, while another reader may find it complicated.
The author does make room for a few actions that have major consequences for his character. But he always seems to find a portion of energy to throw himself even more intensely into the investigation with his stubbornness.
In short, Vermoedens contains an exciting story in which hidden secrets from the past slowly come to light. The author has clearly researched the parts of the story that cross the Belgian border and manages to make those sections interesting and engaging for the reader. The writing style is pleasantly readable, though the reader experiences some discomfort with the
lack of clear timelines, which causes the narrative to hop back and forth between the present and past tense. With the occasional use of Flemish spelling, he will likely raise some eyebrows among Dutch readers; for example the word 'leraars', which is common in Flanders but is written as 'leraren' in the Netherlands. But a nitpicker who worries about that much, 'Vermoedens' is a book that can be read and appreciated by a broad audience.
Overall verdict: 4.0 stars
Suspense: 3 stars
Plot: 3 stars
Reading pleasure: 4 stars
Writing style: 4 stars
Originality: 4 stars
Psychology: 4 stars
(Cees van Rhienen, Hebban)
