Breakwater

Press Quotes

Praise for Breakwater

“A woman’s tranquil life is disrupted by a traumatic memory in Schermer’s haunting latest (after Love, If That’s What It Is). In a stunning ending, Emilia’s secrets and Bruch’s lies come to the surface with staggering consequences for the marriage. This complex psychological study illuminates what it means to be human.” ―Publishers Weekly

“Excellent novel. Packed with emotional truth and elegantly turned narrative. A fine translation too.”
IAN McEWAN

“Breakwater is a concise, cutting story about trauma, post-traumatic stress, and misdirected love.”
Foreword Reviews

“Breakwater is that rare kind of novel, equally mysterious and profound, that effortlessly brings forth the unspoken paradoxes that lurk in every household; the need to be sheltered versus the desire to be free, the craving for intimacy versus the inability to divulge one’s secrets. And the secrets Marijke Schermer writes about are big and dark and violent. They show us that the wounds of sexual aggression may be covered up, but never fully heal. Breakwater is easily one of the best books to come out of the Netherlands in a long time.”
JOOST DE VRIES, author of The Republic

“Powerful characters and dialogues abound in this poignant story of love, autonomy and the devastating power of secrets.”
IVO VAN HOVE

“This writer knows what she’s doing, that much is clear. Breakwater is a book that hurts. The supreme happiness and blunt violation of it are placed side by side with great precision. Ineluctably, it advances toward a climax. Now I want to read this writer’s other work too.”
De Groene Amsterdammer

“A well-thought-out study of suppressed emotion following on from a violent attack.”
TripFiction

“Her second novel starts in an exemplary and classical fashion in all senses. Schermer work reminds one of Ian McEwan’s. But with the ending she then mocks the classical form and norm. This is excellent literature.”
NRC

“What Marijke Schermer does in Breakwater is incredible. The story—in language that streams and flows and hits home—grows increasingly oppressive.”
MARJON KOK

“Every time I read the first chapter I honestly think: this is so good, this is so wonderful. I like everything about it.”
MARJA PRUIS

“An exemplary tale of lies and silence.”
De Limburger

Praise for Love, If That’s What It Is

“The author expertly humanizes each of the characters’ desires and flaws as she illuminates the raw, inner workings of a broken marriage. This is as cathartic as it is gut-churning. … A scintillating debut.”
Publishers Weekly

“In Love, If That’s What It Is Marijke Schermer dissects ordinary family life so subtly and yet so vibrantly, that it leaves you out of breath and makes you reevaluate your own most self-evident assumptions.”
ROXANE VAN IPEREN, author of The High Nest

“Insightful and engrossing.”
The Herald

“Marijke Schermer flawlessly analyzes how love takes its course.”
Het Parool

“On every page Schermer excels with sentences that seem ordinary, but are packed with meaning. After every striking sentence, I had to put the book down for a while. This book is about love—if that’s what it is, of course—and who has not become love’s victim?”
Trouw

“Schermer’s technical ingenuity traps you, making you question your standards, assumptions, and blind spots. This is a big and definitive, but also investigative, story about love. Schermer is fast becoming one of the most interesting writers in the Netherlands.”
NRC Handelsblad

“Love, If That’s What It Is has the potential to become as successful as Herman Koch’s The Dinner.”
De Standaard

“Schermer’s fresh style adds something really new to the mountain of stories about falling in love, unhappy marriages, cheating, and heartbreak—she seems to have cleared the dust off the whole theme.”
De Volkskrant

“Schermer zooms in on the essential question of how autonomous you can still be when you live together. This novel has a careful and poetic style and is precise in its construction. Schermer effortlessly manages to infect you with the feelings of the novel’s characters. Love, If That’s What It Is paws and tugs at your fixed concepts.”
Tzum

“Stories about love and relationships have often been told, but Schermer’s approach to these themes puts it all into a new light and cannot be compared with that of any other writer. Her work has been compared with Ian McEwan’s, though, in which often a wrong step or decision radically alters a life for good.”
Literair Nederland