tiff_aslay 's review for:

My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry by Fredrik Backman

2.0

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This book frustrated me to no end. 

I loved the premise. I thought it was beautifully symbolic to have her grandmothers fairy tales be representative of her life. The way Elsa processes her grief over her grandmothers passing was incredibly complex. 

However, I found that this novel was poorly written. It was nauseatingly repetitive and could have easily been about 100 pages shorter. 

I also found the main characters age to be quite a bit of an issue. Frankly, seven year olds don’t behave in the ways that the main character did. It would have made no negative difference to the plot for her to have been 12-13 instead of seven. 

Lastly, I thought that the bullying subplot at the beginning of the book was rather two dimensional and wasn’t properly fleshed out. It seems that either that section should have been excluded, or properly resolved. 

I ended up giving this book 2 stars. I did find the characters and premise enjoyable, but there were glaring flaws that made this a difficult read.