Flemish writer Peter Verhelst has won this year’s Gouden Griffel (golden slate pencil) award for the best Dutch language children’s book for Het geheim van de keel van de nachtegaal (the secret of the nightingale’s throat).

The book, a reworking of the Hans Christian Anderson fairytale, is Verhelst’s first children’s book. He has already published eight volumes of poetry and five novels.
The jury said the book is a ‘magical world of words and pictures’ in which the author brings an ‘ode to simplicity, innocence and all that is real and true’.
The 55th children’s book week kicks off on Wednesday and runs until October 17. The focus this year is on food. The free book given to everyone spending more than €10 on children’s books during the week was written by last year’s Gouden Griffel winner Jan Paul Schutten. It is called De wraak van het spruitje (the revenge of the sprout).