Awkward Evening

The novel is the winner of the International Booker Prize 2020.

«Awkward Evening» is a rocky road into the world of cruel childhood imagination, suddenly derailed in the face of an unexpected death, which no one wants to talk about but which no one is ready to forget. Mattis fell through the ice and died, but his fall into the dark water lasts for years, gnawing at the hearts of the family with corrosive rust. The coldness and silence of the parents paralyzes the lives of the children with a deadly chill, forcing them to cope with death and growing up on their own. And the paths taken by their own bodies and fears are not marked by divine grace, but by shocking, dangerous paganism.

Yas is a strange child, in her fantasies, childish naive cruelty clashes with piety, love with envy, the life of the body with the fates of loved ones. When, in a tragic accident, Yas's older brother dies by falling through the ice, the Mulders' lives are irreparably changed. Death is not spoken of, but silently settling on the farm, its shadow paints Yas's imagination with frightening darkness.