The Safekeep

An exquisitely atmospheric psychological thriller set in early-60s rural Netherlands, van der Wouden's award-winning debut revolves around the escalating tension between controlling Isabel and her brother's graceless new girlfriend.

Winner of the Women's Prize for Fiction 2025

Waterstones Fiction Book of the Month for July 2025

An exhilarating tale of twisted desire, histories and homes, and the unexpected shape of revenge - for readers of Patricia Highsmith, Sarah Waters and Ian McEwan's Atonement.

It is fifteen years after the Second World War, and Isabel has built herself a solitary life of discipline and strict routine in her late mother's country home, with not a fork or a word out of place. But all is upended when her brother Louis delivers his graceless new girlfriend, Eva, at Isabel's doorstep - as a guest, there to stay for the season…

In the sweltering heat of summer, Isabel's desperate need for control reaches boiling point. What happens between the two women leads to a revelation which threatens to unravel all she has ever known.

MEDIA REVIEWS

I realise I’m quite late to this party but, my god, what a book. It’s an incredible novel, delicate yet tough, and pitted with narrative landmines. It blew me away. I haven’t been as enthralled by a novel for a long time. I have immediately insisted that everyone I know reads it. - Maggie O'Farrell

The Safekeep seeped into my subconscious, took hold and stayed inside me even after I’d finished reading it. Breathtaking prose, febrile suspense and exceptional plot twist towards the end. So many wonderful novels out there, but this one really does stand out - Bernardine Evaristo

Surprising, chilling, and electric. The Safekeep is a simply fantastic work of literature. - Alice Winn, bestselling author of IN MEMORIAM

Yael van der Wouden's compelling , clever novel features several irresistible literary devices. A grand old house. A festering family secret. The shadow of the second world war. And plenty of erotic tension , bringing heat to a story that interrogates dark themes of antisemitism, displacement and inherited trauma...The thrill of Van der Wouden's sly book is that it feels both juicy and deeply important - Observer

The Safekeep is a dream of a novel — mesmerizing and shockingly good — it lulls you with the lyrical beauty of its words and then slams you awake with its raw passion and rage. Part silent scream, part breathless love story - Miranda Cowley Heller, bestselling author of THE PAPER PALACE

Haunting and exquisitely poignant - Claire Fuller

Moving, unnerving and deeply sexy - Tracy Chevalier, author of GIRL WITH A PEARL EARRING

The story is resolved in such a bold and tender way that it becomes not merely clever, but indelible - New York Times

An impressive debut; I already look forward to Van der Wouden’s next - Guardian

What a staggering book. Best thing I’ve read in quite a while - Patrick Radden Keefe