From the Life of Dik Trom

But beneath all that rowdiness beats a good heart. When the village boys work each other up in the evenings with tales about the witch of the Achterweg, Dik is the only one who dares to go and look. Through the window he sees no witch, but a poor old woman trying to feed her sick husband with the last crust of bread. He runs home, asks his mother for food, and brings it himself, without waiting for thanks.

C. Joh. Kieviet writes plainly and warmly, with scenes that make you laugh out loud and, now and then, one that leaves you quiet. A whole village comes to life around Dik: his indulgent mother Griet, the skinny schoolmistress who's afraid of frogs, the miserly farmer Mulder. And Dik himself gradually grows out of his rascal's ways, until poverty and hardship force him to prove what he's really made of. A classic children's novel about a boy no one forgets—if only for his size, and then for everything beneath it.