A hockey town in the middle of the trees.

As accusation on the day of the big tournament.

A battle between right and wrong.

Beartown by Fredrik Backman has become very popular since its arrival in 2016. What first drew me in was the masterfully written first chapter, filled to the brim with intrigue and shock.

I had read the first chapter quite a few times, hoping that I would then dive into the rest of the book but it never seemed to happen. I even loaned out the book to a student who raved about it after reading it. So this past summer, I decided that it had to make its way to the list.

When I was finally able to settle into Backman’s writing style, I began to enjoy the book. He writes in a way that is different than most of the books I read or have read and it took me quite a while to adjust to it. (It might have been related to my mood, but it is hard to tell for sure.)

Each character is placed with care and written with the utmost clarity in order to bring together the whole story. What felt so different, was the quick jumps between the numerous amounts of characters. Beartown jumps between these characters rapidly and without any indication of who is our new center of focus.

Backman has a very prophetic way of describing the scenes and situations in these stories. I really enjoyed the way he was able to connect elements of personal relationships, psychology, and community, to the book but also to the reader.

Overall, this story tackled some challenging concepts between right and wrong and what it means to seek justice for a wrong doing. I enjoyed the book more and more after mulling it over in my head.

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Have you read Beartown? What did you think?

Happy reading!