* SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2024 BOOKER PRIZE * * WINNER OF THE NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARD FOR
DEBUT FICTION * * WINNER OF THE 2025 WOMEN’S PRIZE FOR FICTION * Shortlisted for the 2025
Dylan Thomas Prize and Aspen Words Literary Prize • A Best Book of 2024: The New York Times
The Washington Post Los Angeles Times Time The Economist The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
Kirkus Reviews The Independent BookPage The Sunday Times (London)
“Remarkable…Compelling…Fine and taut…Indelible.” — The New York Times • “Moving unnerving and
deeply sexy.” —Tracy Chevalier author of Girl with the Pearl Earring • “A brilliant debut as
multi-faceted as a gem.” — Kirkus Reviews A “razor-sharp perfectly plotted” ( The Sunday
Times London) tale of desire suspicion and obsession between two women staying in the same
house in the Dutch countryside during the summer of 1961—a powerful exploration of the legacy
of WWII and the darker parts of our collective past. A house is a precious thing... It is
1961 and the rural Dutch province of Overijssel is quiet. Bomb craters have been filled
buildings reconstructed and the war is truly over. Living alone in her late mother’s country
home Isabel knows her life is as it should be—led by routine and discipline. But all is
upended when her brother Louis brings his graceless new girlfriend Eva leaving her at Isabel’s
doorstep as a guest to stay for the season. Eva is Isabel’s antithesis: she sleeps late
walks loudly through the house and touches things she shouldn’t. In response Isabel develops
a fury-fueled obsession and when things start disappearing around the house—a spoon a knife
a bowl—Isabel’s suspicions begin to spiral. In the sweltering peak of summer Isabel’s paranoia
gives way to infatuation leading to a discovery that unravels all Isabel has ever known. The
war might not be well and truly over after all and neither Eva—nor the house in which they
live—are what they seem. Mysterious sophisticated sensual and infused with intrigue
atmosphere and sex The Safekeep is “a brave and thrilling debut about facing up to the truth
of history and to one’s own desires” ( The Guardian ).
