The Ascent

The dazzling new novel from the author of the modern classic War and Turpentine.

In 1979, Stefan Hertmans fell in love with a dilapidated old house in Ghent in Belgium, which he rescued from decay as it became his peaceful sanctuary. Now, all these years later, he learns that a bust of Hitler once sat on the mantelpiece and a war criminal and his family relaxed in its rooms.

This shocking discovery sends Hertmans off to the archives, to uncover the secrets of the house and to reimagine this man's life and expose the atrocities he's responsible for. We see Willem Verhulst as a weak, narcissistic man who climbed high in the ranks of the SS: a fascinating and chilling case study for the cruel and perverse mentality of the Nazis.

A story of war, family and individual fate, The Ascent portrays the deep tragedy of Flemish collaboration during the Second World War. Hertmans masterfully brings history and the house to life, as he imagines individual lives to tell the greater European story.

Translated from the Dutch by David McKay