Jef Geeraerts (born as Jozef Adriaan Anna Geeraerts, Antwerp, 23 February 1930 - Ghent, 11 May 2015) was a Belgian writer.

After his studies on political and adminstrative sciensces at the Koloniale Hogeschool in Antwerp

Career as a writer

When he had finished his studies he wrote his first novel, Ik ben maar een neger ("I'm just a negro"), which put him on the map as extremely controversial. The book was based on his experience as military in the Congo. He wrote more of these politically motivated colonial books before he started his Gangreen series. There are four parts, Gangreen 1 (Black Venus), Gangreen 2 (De Goede Moordenaar), Gangreen 3 (Het Teken van de Hond) and Gangreen 4 (Het Zevende Zegel). These books included a lot of sexuality which led to controversy in Belgium. His books were considered racist (because his love for the black women in general) and pornographic.

Later Geeraerts became famous for his detective stories. Nowadays he is a celebrated crime-novelist and several of his books (De zaak Alzheimer and Dossier K) have been filmed.

In total Geeraerts wrote 35 novels, some plays and a radio drama. Two of his books were used for a film.

Private life

Geeraerts has three children from a first marriage, among these his daughter Ilse. In 1978 he married Eleonore Vigenon. In the last years of his life he lived in Baarle Drongen, part of Ghent. He died from a heart attack.

Awards

• 1967 – Arkprijs van het Vrije Woord for De Troglodieten
• 1969 - Staatsprijs voor verhalend proza
• 1986 - de Gouden Strop for best Dutch crime novel

(incomplete list)

The town of Antwerp mounted a memory plate on the birth house of Geeraerts. In addition, the town bought his handwritten archive for conservation.

Main-belt Asteroid

The 13027 Geeraerts (1989 GJ4) is a Main-belt Asteroid discovered on 3 April 1989 by E. W. Elst at the European Southern Observatory named after Jef Geeraerts

he became a colonial administrator in Belgian Congo. On the independence of the Congo he sent his wife and children back to Belgium and in August 1960 he himself returned to Belgium. During the next six years he was paid by the government (return program). After that time he needed to find a job to survive. He decided to become a writer and went to the University of Brussels to study Germanic languages.