A stand-up comedian with a debut novel, you're joking? Not at all. Here we have a prime example of the new guard emerging from Belgium and gaining attention in The Netherlands. A regular on the comedy scene he's been holding back on his writing all this time. Herman Brusselmans, J.D. Salinger, Gerard Reve and the Scottish writers Alan Warner en Iain Banks are all of great inspiration to him. Since 2002 Foncke started to write letters to people in his environment. 43 of his epistles have been collected in the autobiographical novel of letters De geachten [The Dears].

• The additional information is unfortunately in Dutch