Well hello there, guys! I finished this book a few days ago and I loved it so much. I am going to split this post into some categories so that you can skip to which ever part you like. Also I am going to try and keep it spoiler free, but if there are going to be some you will see a spoiler warning before it.
Trigger Warnings: talk about suicide, death;
1. Short summary of the book
“This story is about a lot of things, but mostly about idiots.” This is one of the very first sentences and I have to wholeheartedly agree, because after all aren’t all humans’ idiots? I think so. On the day before New Year’s Eve, in a small town from Sweden, happens a series of unlucky events. It first starts with a failed bank robbery and it progresses into a hostage drama situation. Everyone that is taken hostage is, as expected, an idiot. This is how this beautiful story about the connections between people starts.
2. Characters
I am now going to tell you a little bit about every character that is relevant to the story, except the bank robber, because I think you should keep the allure for when you read this book.
This book has such realistic characters that I often found myself thinking if I’ve actually met these people before (and to be completely honest I think we all have) and I really liked that. None of them are perfect, they all have their flaws, but that’s what’s interesting and so humane about them.
Anna-Lena and Roger:
They are a middle-aged couple that buys apartments to flip them afterwards, trying to fill the growing whole in their marriage. Anna-Lena is afraid of upsetting her husband and telling him just how much she wants a home, not just another apartment that they are going to eventually sell. She is a very sweet person, that tries her best not to anger her husband and is very docile. Later on in the story her personality evolves and we can see another side of her, one that she doesn’t show that often. Roger to me is still a mystery. You can tell that he cares about his wife in his own way, even if he might not show it at first. I am glad that they worked through their struggles in the end.
Jules and Ro:
They are a sapphic couple waiting for their child and desperately trying to find a home. They’ve had a hard time with that so far, but they think this is their lucky find. I mean, that was, of course, after the whole hostage drama situation. Jules is the pregnant one, so she probably took it the worst out of all the hostages, but she is a very extroverted person and quarrelsome at times. Ru, on the other hand, is a pretty introverted person that has this constant fear that she is going to somehow end up being a bad parent. Besides them being opposites, they make so much sense together, that you can’t help but root for them.
Estelle:
She is a grandma that wants to spend her holidays doing something and being surrounded by new people. Estelle is such a sweet person. I loved her so much.
Every time she was mentioned I was so happy, because she was like a ray of sunshine.
Zara:
She is a lonely bank manager, that at first seems snobbish and like she hates everyone, which is, in a way, true, but there is so much more to her character, making her my favorite person from this book. Through the book, we have some chapters describing her therapy sessions and I think that that was the moment that I started liking her, because of how flawed she is (I know it sound silly, but it’s true). There is clearly some unresolved trauma that she has to work through, and I am really glad she did at the end of the story. I am now going to try and convince you that she is amazing, just by this quote:
“Zara: You said ‘him’, so you evidently know he was a man. That explains a lot.
Police officer: I have a feeling I’m likely to regret asking this, but why?
Zara: You lot can’t even pi** without missing the target. So obviously things are going to go wrong if you get hold of a pistol.”
3. Writing style
This was my first time reading a Backman novel, and I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised by the writing style. It was beautiful, yet easy to understand and pretty informal. I enjoyed that, because this novel is a realistic one, that did not shy away from showing people as they actually are, and that sort of realistic approach needed just this kind of ordinary writing, to make the story extraordinary.
4. Things that I loved about it
As I have previously mentioned, I really liked how human the characters were, but besides that, I also liked how they were all connected to one another in some strange way; they have similar struggles, have met each other before, but can’t remember and so on. Another thing that I really enjoyed was how things tied up at the end, there really where no loose ends (which I kind of expected while reading it, because there were a lot of things happening). If you are a fan of short chapter, like myself, then I think you will like this book (there are longer chapter at times- 12/14 pages, but most of them have less than 10 pages), at least it’s pacing. The story is written in two different time lines: g the hostage drama and after it, keeping the reader on the edge of its seat, because of the number of small cliffhangers. Lastly, throughout the book we encounter the bridge, which is a symbol that signifies communication and union.
5. Things I didn’t enjoy
I think that I would have liked this book even more if it was shorter. While reading it I just felt like there were things that could have been cut from the book. One other small thing that I would’ve loved was a more complex mystery plot point. I did buy this book for the character focused story, but at times when Backman was focusing on the mystery aspect of the book, I just wished for more.
6. Favorite quotes
“Just before the bank robber came in she had been busy refreshing her browser to find out if two famous actors were going to get divorced or not. She hoped they were, because sometimes it’s easier to live with your own anxieties if you know that no one else is happy, either.”
“She isn’t traumatised, she isn’t weighted down by any obvious grief. She’s just sad, all the time. An evil little creature that wouldn’t have shown up on any X-rays was living in her chest, rushing through her blood and filling her head with whispers, saying she wasn’t good enough, that she was weak and ugly and would never be anything but broken. You can get it into your head to do some unbelievably stupid things when you run out of tears, when you can’t silence the voices no one else can hear, when you’ve never been in a room where you felt normal.”
7. Overall opinion
I felt like this story was a very enjoyable one and that everyone should read a Fredrik Backman novel, due to his delightful writing style. I will say that if character focused stories aren’t your thing, then maybe this book isn’t for you, because in all the 390 pages of this book we try to understand how all these seemingly shallow characters actually are.
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