Beartown

By: Fredrik Backman

Narrated by: Marin Ireland

Now an HBO Original Series

“You’ll love this engrossing novel.” —People

Named a Best Book of the Year by LibraryReads, BookBrowse, and Goodreads

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Anxious People, a dazzling and profound novel about a small town with a big dream—and the price required to make it come true.

By the lake in Beartown is an old ice rink, and in that ice rink Kevin, Amat, Benji, and the rest of the town’s junior ice hockey team are about to compete in the national semi-finals—and they actually have a shot at winning. All the hopes and dreams of this place now rest on the shoulders of a handful of teenage boys.

Under that heavy burden, the match becomes the catalyst for a violent act that will leave a young girl traumatized and a town in turmoil. Accusations are made and, like ripples on a pond, they travel through all of Beartown.

This is a story about a town and a game, but even more about loyalty, commitment, and the responsibilities of friendship; the people we disappoint even though we love them; and the decisions we make every day that come to define us. In this story of a small forest town, Fredrik Backman has found the entire world.

Backman Can Write Any Point of View!

I've read most of Backman's books, and this author is amazingly talented. When I read "A Man Called Ove," I thought, this guy must know my daughters and their grandfathers, because the characters' interactions are spot on. When I read, "Britt-Marie Was Here," I thought, he must know an older woman who felt discarded, because she seems so real. In "My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry," I assumed he must have lived in an apartment building where his neighbors represented, all walks of life, because each character was alive and unique. Now, in "Beartown," I jokingly conclude that he is in fact a pseudonym for what must be a team of authors, each specializing in writing a certain point of view, because his representation of the human teenager was very accurate.

"Beartown" is about so many things: parenthood, navigating being a teen, the desperation that can engulf a small town into pack mentality. It touches on retirement and how it effects a sense of purpose. We see immeasurable loss, beating the odds, perseverance, abuse, revenge, forgiveness...and so much more.

From the above paragraph, you may think those are too many subjects to tackle in one book, but Backman makes it flow naturally and realistically.

At times, I felt that he was bordering on over description in regards to each character's inner thoughts, but as I read on, I came to appreciate the time he took to bring the reader into the characters' heads. Some may feel that the following is a spoiler, but I want to explain what I mean with an example, therefore, I'll preface the next section.

*Possibly could be considered a spoiler*

At one point, some boys throw a rock with an expletive written on it through a window. The mother/wife gets in her car and scares the boys in a way that could be perceived as unstable. But the reader has been inside her head. We've seen what she's been through. She's endured unimaginable loss. Outwardly, she seems abrasive and uncompromising, but the reader knows how much she has sacrificed for those she loves. You feel her desperation and helplessness and anger. Despite knowing how wrong it would have been, had she actually caused permanent damage, I found myself cheering her on; then, when she came to her senses, so did I. She wasn't insane; she had a temporary moment of insanity. Backman took a lot of time to get us inside her mind, and it allows the reader to understand her irrational behavior.

*End of possible spoiler*

What I like best about the book is the multiple layers given to each character. We see tough guys in moments of sensitivity. We see sensitive guys finding their strengths. It is easy to dismiss a character as universally shallow, until we see the character in a different environment and we watch them bloom into someone we'd like to know. Heroes make selfish/life altering choices and bullies evolve into better people.

I especially like the ending, because it felt so complete that I actually exhaled. This is a great book for discussion, and I'm encouraging my teen daughters to read it. The narrator's performance was spectacular in the audio version. I highly recommend it!

Best book I've listened to in years

I'm not often motivated to write reviews of any kind but I had to with Beartown. As the title says, I haven't enjoyed and been as riveted to a book as much as this in a long time. The character and story development is perfect. What's even more amazing, is that this book was translated from another language. I would never have known that other than the currency that is used in the story. I'm really not a sports enthusiast and couldn't care less about hockey, and none of that kept me from enjoying the hell out of this book.

An emotional rollarcoaster you'll want to ride

For someone who really doesn't know, or care to know, about hockey - - I thought I'd finally found the Backman book I wasn't going to like. Silly me. This book is brilliant. No one in Beartown is simple or stupid or all bad or all good - - they're just relatable because you know them or sometimes, you are them. Backman moves his readers to Beartown to live and die with the families whose lives revolve around a sport. Hockey is the perfect vehicle for much more complicated problems and feelings that are involved with being part of a community, and Beartown is a community that you will want to live with, and in, for a long time.

This is not about Hockey. This is about people.

This is not about Hockey. This is about people. This is about simplest yet most complicated human nature. This is about beartown. Fredrik Backman has did it again.

Must read

One of those books that touches you so deeply, that as soon as you finish you want to start it all over again.