Review: I'll Keep You Close
I'll Keep You Close by Jeska Verstegen Levine Querido Category: Middle Grade Reviewer: Beth L. Gallego Buy at Bookshop.org How does one honor the memory of those who died during a time one wants to forget? Debut novelist Jeska Verstegen examines the toll secret grief took on her own family in this poignant volume, originally published in the Netherlands as Ik zal je bewaren and translated from the Dutch by Bill Nagelkerke. In snapshot vignettes, eleven-year-old Jesje presents, at first, unremarkable days in the ordinary life of a girl in 1980s Amsterdam. Perhaps her mother is unusually anxious, but that’s just how Mama is. Bomma, Jesje’s maternal grandmother, is in a nearby nursing home, suffering from dementia that has taken a turn for the worse. During a visit, she calls Jesje by someone else’s name, Hesje, and Mama refuses to say more than that it is the name of someone from far in the past. Curious, Jesje investigates, gathering information from other famil...