The Discomfort of Evening

I thought about being too small for so much, but that no one told you when you were big enough, how many centimetres on the doorpost that was, and I asked God if he please couldn't take my brother Matthies instead of my rabbit. 'Amen.' Ten year old Jas lives with her devout family in the rural Netherlands. The Bible is the most important thing in their lives. One winter's day, Jas's older brother Matthies joins an ice skating trip near the farm; resentful at being left alone, she makes a perverse plea to God; and he never returns. As grief ripples through the family, warping everyday life in strange ways that threaten to derail them all, Jas retreats into disturbing fantasies. Guilty and agonised, she watches as the family disintegrates around her into ever-increasing darkness. Studded with astonishing poetic images - violent, raw and surreal - The Discomfort of the Evening lays everything bare with magnetic intensity. It is a reading experience unlike any other.