Marieke Lucas Rijneveld (b. 1991) grew up in a Reformed farming family in North Brabant before moving to Utrecht. One of the most exciting new voices in Dutch literature, their poetry collection, Calfskin, was awarded the C. Buddingh' Prize for best poetry debut in 2015, with the newspaper de Volkskrant calling them literary talent of the year. In 2018, Atlas Contact published their first novel, The Discomfort of Evening, which was a national bestseller as well as being nominated for the Libris Literature Prize and winning the prestigious ANV Debut Prize. Alongside their writing career, Rijneveld works on a dairy farm.

The sensational Dutch bestseller: Marieke Lucas Rijneveld's extraordinary portrait of a farming family distorted by grief, translated by Michele Hutchison.

I asked God if he please couldn't take my brother Matthies instead of my rabbit. 'Amen.'

Ten-year-old Jas has a unique way of experiencing her universe: the feeling of udder ointment on her skin as protection against harsh winters; the texture of green warts, like capers, on migrating toads; the sound of 'blush words' that aren't in the Bible. But when a tragic accident ruptures the family, her curiosity warps into a vortex of increasingly disturbing fantasies - unlocking a darkness that threatens to derail them all.

A bestselling sensation in the Netherlands, Marieke Lucas Rijneveld's radical debut novel is studded with images of wild, violent beauty: a world of language unlike any other.