The Book
‘Lately, I have been comparing life and its daily routine with board games. I had reached a point where I wondered if I had chosen the right game and I dreamed of being able to roll the dice once more and start over again.’
At the age of 31, Cassi is at a crossroads in her life. She has misgivings about her plans to marry Daniel, is bored with her job, and her relationship with family and friends is proving difficult. She yearns to be alone, to think quietly and calmly for once. So her grandmother’s request that she clear out an attic in an otherwise empty house comes at just the right time. But, even there, it turns out Cassi is not alone.
Will the family secrets and intrigues of the past bring Cassi insight into the present?
Winner of the 2021 Indie Awards Public Prize (Dutch/Flemish edition)
How The Book Came To Be
Helena explains: “The journey of the story and my eternal doubts would make a good novel on its own. I was about fifteen or sixteen when I jotted down the first ideas of a story. At twenty-two, I had some sort of a manuscript. Fact is I worked on the story on and off (the longest break was five years) until the jigsaw was finally put into place when I was … fifty.
The characters remained the same through the years. But at a certain point I was not interested in a story of an eighteen-year-old, so when I was in my early thirties, I made Cassi (the main character) thirty-one years old (instead of eighteen) and her half-brother thirty-eight instead of twenty-five. I didn't want to let go of the characters as I felt quite attached to them since they 'had been in my head' for over ten years at that time. But their story was not very interesting to me anymore. I was happy to find a solution to keep them by aging them up and sharing their challenges as thirty somethings instead of teenagers. The entire story is a mix of autobiographical experiences (spread over several characters), observations and my imagination.”
Helena Buckinx first started writing the book thirty years previously and decided to age up her characters when she returned to it to embrace the new challenges that people in their thirties face.
The cover is a painting of hers as she is also an artist. The Belgium version (written in Dutch) won the 2021 Indie Awards Public Prize.
The Author
Helena Buckinx grew up in Brussels. She has worked as an events and communications manager for over twenty years.
At sixteen, she discovered her greatest passion, painting, and has organised several exhibitions of her own work. Her other ambition was to write a novel.
Travellers in Transit is her debut, winning the Indie Awards Public Prize (2021, Belgium).
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