The #1 New York Times bestselling author of A Man Called Ove returns with a dazzling, profound novel about a small town with a big dream—and the price required to make it come true.
About the Book:
People say Beartown is finished. A tiny community nestled deep in the forest, it is slowly losing ground to the ever encroaching trees. But down by the lake stands an old ice rink, built generations ago by the working men who founded this town. And in that ice rink is the reason people in Beartown believe tomorrow will be better than today. Their junior ice hockey team is 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.
Being responsible for the hopes of an entire town is a heavy burden, and the semi-final match is 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, leaving no resident unaffected.
Beartown explores the hopes that bring a small community together, the secrets that tear it apart, and the courage it takes for an individual to go against the grain. In this story of a small forest town, Fredrik Backman has found the entire world
About the Author:
Fredrik Backman is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of A Man Called Ove (soon to be a major motion picture starring Tom Hanks), My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She’s Sorry, Britt-Marie Was Here, Beartown, Us Against You, as well as two novellas, And Every Morning the Way Home Gets Longer and Longer and The Deal of a Lifetime. Things My Son Needs to Know About the World, his first work of non-fiction, will be released in the US in May 2019. His books are published in more than forty countries. He lives in Stockholm, Sweden, with his wife and two children.
My Review:
If you follow my blog then you will know I adored A Man Called Ove and Britt-Marie Was Here so when Fredrik Backman has a new book out I don’t even really need to read the blurb, which is probably a good thing considering this book is about a tiny town in a large Swedish forest and their hockey team. The book has actually been sitting on my kindle for the past 18 months and I kept moving it down my TBR pile because other books miraculously appeared (no idea how that happens!!), so when I received my free audible credit it seemed to make sense to download the audible version, walk the dog and listen to Beartown.
Firstly, I need to say that the narrator, John Sackville is SUPERB and has a voice I could listen to forever. It was easy to get lost in his narration and actually imagine yourself immersed in the forest of Beartown watching all the characters come to life and follow their stories.
Fredrik Backman is, in my opinion, simply a literary genius – he creates characters you truly believe in; brings them to life so vividly you can almost touch, smell and feel them. His prose is purely poetic, his observations of the most minute of details are utterly beautiful. Beartown is a book to savour rather than devour.
If you are fans of atmospheric, character driven, beautifully crafted stories, then I would definitely recommend you read/listen to Beartown.
Note: This was previously published as The Scandal.
