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Reünie
Dorian Pots arriveert op een zonnige meidag in Diepenheim, de stad van zijn jeugd. Hij denkt een nieuw leven te beginnen met zijn vroegere kalverliefde Jasper van Vliet. Maar dan ziet hij Titus Balkenhol op het terras van café Boonk, gekleed in een blauwe bolletjesjurk. Deze oude schoolkameraad tegen wil en dank zegt tegen hem: ‘Tot vanavond bij de reünie van onze oude schoolklas.’ Reünie? Waarom weet Dorian daar niets van? Zijn vroegere klasgenoten hebben nog meer verrassingen in petto. Ingrediënten voor een even grimmige als vermakelijke tragikomedie over pestkoppen, hun slachtoffers en een klasse reünie die zich als wraakoefening ontpopt.
Het sprookjesachtige proza van Gaby den Held is kleurrijk en filmisch. Zijn stijl is toegankelijk en helder. Hoe bizar en grotesk de verhalen soms ook zijn, je staat altijd met één been in de werkelijkheid. Hij toont zich wars van genres. Zijn de verhalen sprookjes of liefdesromans? Tragedies of komedies? Het dondert niet. Het zijn verhalen die het kind dat altijd in de volwassene aanwezig blijft, zou willen horen. Ze verleiden je, ontroeren je, maar kunnen je ook misleiden. De vertellingen voeren je mee in een sfeer die zo aangenaam is, dat je de wrange bitterheid en het duister pas opmerkt als het te laat is.
Het sprookjesachtige proza van Gaby den Held is kleurrijk en filmisch. Zijn stijl is toegankelijk en helder. Hoe bizar en grotesk de verhalen soms ook zijn, je staat altijd met één been in de werkelijkheid. Hij toont zich wars van genres. Zijn de verhalen sprookjes of liefdesromans? Tragedies of komedies? Het dondert niet. Het zijn verhalen die het kind dat altijd in de volwassene aanwezig blijft, zou willen horen. Ze verleiden je, ontroeren je, maar kunnen je ook misleiden. De vertellingen voeren je mee in een sfeer die zo aangenaam is, dat je de wrange bitterheid en het duister pas opmerkt als het te laat is.
153 pages, Paperback
Published October 1, 2017
1 person is currently reading
2 people want to read
About the author
Gaby den Held
5 books3 followersAs long as he can remember he writes stories. He has written poems and participated in a poetry platform, Poetry Alive! He has also written culinary articles, restaurant reviews and travelogues (2002-2009). He didn’t think of writing a novel. Until a traumatic event knocked him over.
"You write stories, do you?" a friend said. "Why don’t you write it all up and do something with it?" That 'something' has slowly grown into a story in which the sometimes harsh reality is mixed with a fairy tale. The story is about Ángel Flores who is tragically in love with CHARLIE DARK.
The foundation was laid for his personal style:
Imaginative fairytale-like stories populated with sometimes extravagant characters. But how bizarre and grotesque the stories sometimes may seem, they always have one foot in reality, like in a magical realist painting.
The foundation was laid for his personal style: succinct and clear prose with a complex storyline. The atmosphere is imaginative and fairytale-like with a penchant for the extravagant. But how bizarre and grotesque the stories sometimes may seem, they always have one foot in reality, like in a magical realist painting. Deceptively lighthearted and naturally heavy themes are covered as gender dysphoria, sexual fluidity, sexual harassment, suicide, perpetratorship and victimhood.
Maan: not exactly the typical teenage love story
After he wrote Charlie Dark he began on his second novel MAAN (Moon). This would ultimately be his debut as a published novelist. The theme
is self-determination and individual freedom, wrapped in a story about an impossible love. As a main character he chose the trans woman Maan who wants to make her own choices on all aspects of life. If Maan is still a boy he lives with his eccentric mother, Saskia, the widow of the wealthy merchant Lambert Humalda, in a big house on the edge of the Frisian Dantumadiel. Rick is in love with the beautiful Maan, but becomes confused when he tells him that he is really a girl.
Reünie: a tragicomedy about revenge
He decided to keep his firstling, Charlie Dark, in the drawer and began a new novel, a tragicomedy about revenge: REÜNIE (Reunion).
Dorian Pots arrives on a sunny May day in Diepenheim, the city of his youth. He intends to start a new life with his old puppy love Jasper van Vliet. But then he sees Titus Balkenhol on the terrace of cafe Boonk, wearing a blue polka dot dress. This willy-nilly old school chum, the clown of the class, tells him: "See you tonight at the reunion of our old school class." A reunion? Why does Dorian knows nothing about it? His former classmates have more surprises in store.
Alex Stanovsky: never ending train journey
He is now working on ideas for a next novel. This will be about a young man who takes the train to a job interview. It appears that the office where he will have that interview is in the train. In fact, the train turns out to be a world in itself, where he may never come out.
Gaby's debut novel MAAN was published November 2015 and REÜNIE was published October 2017, both by publisher IJZER.
First there are the images, then the words. Before I write I see the fragment for me as a movie scene. It’s no surprise that I’m particularly influenced by the movies. I love the films by Alex van Warmerdam, François Ozon, Roman Polanski, David Lynch and most of all: Federico Fellini. I want to create a slightly caricatural dream world that gives reality a brighter color. That does not deny the ruthlessness of life, but places it in a different light. In that world I introduce tragic clowns. Anti-heroes with panache. Outsiders who were bullied in the schoolyard as a kid. Because they have red hair. Because they don’t play football. Because they are boys who feel like a girl or vice versa. But they have rebounded. They go through life with their heads held high. They remember that statement of ballet legend Sonia Gaskell: If you fall, always make something of it.
"You write stories, do you?" a friend said. "Why don’t you write it all up and do something with it?" That 'something' has slowly grown into a story in which the sometimes harsh reality is mixed with a fairy tale. The story is about Ángel Flores who is tragically in love with CHARLIE DARK.
The foundation was laid for his personal style:
Imaginative fairytale-like stories populated with sometimes extravagant characters. But how bizarre and grotesque the stories sometimes may seem, they always have one foot in reality, like in a magical realist painting.
The foundation was laid for his personal style: succinct and clear prose with a complex storyline. The atmosphere is imaginative and fairytale-like with a penchant for the extravagant. But how bizarre and grotesque the stories sometimes may seem, they always have one foot in reality, like in a magical realist painting. Deceptively lighthearted and naturally heavy themes are covered as gender dysphoria, sexual fluidity, sexual harassment, suicide, perpetratorship and victimhood.
Maan: not exactly the typical teenage love story
After he wrote Charlie Dark he began on his second novel MAAN (Moon). This would ultimately be his debut as a published novelist. The theme
is self-determination and individual freedom, wrapped in a story about an impossible love. As a main character he chose the trans woman Maan who wants to make her own choices on all aspects of life. If Maan is still a boy he lives with his eccentric mother, Saskia, the widow of the wealthy merchant Lambert Humalda, in a big house on the edge of the Frisian Dantumadiel. Rick is in love with the beautiful Maan, but becomes confused when he tells him that he is really a girl.
Reünie: a tragicomedy about revenge
He decided to keep his firstling, Charlie Dark, in the drawer and began a new novel, a tragicomedy about revenge: REÜNIE (Reunion).
Dorian Pots arrives on a sunny May day in Diepenheim, the city of his youth. He intends to start a new life with his old puppy love Jasper van Vliet. But then he sees Titus Balkenhol on the terrace of cafe Boonk, wearing a blue polka dot dress. This willy-nilly old school chum, the clown of the class, tells him: "See you tonight at the reunion of our old school class." A reunion? Why does Dorian knows nothing about it? His former classmates have more surprises in store.
Alex Stanovsky: never ending train journey
He is now working on ideas for a next novel. This will be about a young man who takes the train to a job interview. It appears that the office where he will have that interview is in the train. In fact, the train turns out to be a world in itself, where he may never come out.
Gaby's debut novel MAAN was published November 2015 and REÜNIE was published October 2017, both by publisher IJZER.
First there are the images, then the words. Before I write I see the fragment for me as a movie scene. It’s no surprise that I’m particularly influenced by the movies. I love the films by Alex van Warmerdam, François Ozon, Roman Polanski, David Lynch and most of all: Federico Fellini. I want to create a slightly caricatural dream world that gives reality a brighter color. That does not deny the ruthlessness of life, but places it in a different light. In that world I introduce tragic clowns. Anti-heroes with panache. Outsiders who were bullied in the schoolyard as a kid. Because they have red hair. Because they don’t play football. Because they are boys who feel like a girl or vice versa. But they have rebounded. They go through life with their heads held high. They remember that statement of ballet legend Sonia Gaskell: If you fall, always make something of it.
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