Published by Corgi, Silent Saturday is a novel written for young adults by Helen Grant.
A loud argument between her parents – an increasingly frequent occurance – prompted seven year old Veerle to seek refuge in the village church opposite her home, Sint-Pauluskerk. There she met Kris Verstraten, a boy two years older than her whom she knew from school. It was silent Saturday, the day according to legend, as all Flemish children knew, that the church bells flew off to Rome to get the Easter eggs. Kris had decided to check out the veracity this tale by climbing up into the bell tower.
It was an arduous climb for a small girl but what Veerle and Kris saw from the belfry changed the course of their lives. For Veerle, her parents' divorce and her mother's subsequent overpowering mothering meant that when she and Kris meet up again ten years later she is more than ready for adventure. Kris introduces her to a secret group with an intriguing lifestyle. But what begins as means of escaping her suffocating home life, soon becomes a desperate race to save their own lives and face the demons of the past.
Silent Saturday is a compelling novel which takes readers well out of their comfort zone. Helen Grant establishes her characters and plot within an exceptionally well-written narrative. The relationship between Veerle and her obsessive mother, Claudine, is fine-tuned and an object lesson in the breakdown of family communications. Silent Saturday is also a coming of age novel about first love which is perfectly portrayed as well as a powerful and gripping psychological thriller.
Before I read Silent Saturday, I hadn't realised it is the first in Helen Grant's Forbidden Spaces Trilogy and I'll be intrigued to read the next two books.
PWT rating: ♥♥♥♥♥
Silent Saturday: Forbidden Spaces Trilogy: Book One