Review by pastellus - Beartown

pastellus 's review for:

Beartown by Fredrik Backman

4.0

emotional funny sad

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

"What is a community? It is the sum total of our choices."

This surprised me because it's not at all the kind of novel that I usually gravitate towards, so I would have never expected to find the story as captivating as I did.

This is the tale of a town, and in this, it's also a tale about life; growing up, parenthood, old age, changes, hopes, dreams, success, failure, disappointment, tragedy, regret, grief, and and a plethora of branching themes. It's beautifully crafted, in that sense, and even if there were moments that were very difficult to read, I appreciate that they were part of the story and handled with care by Backman.

However, I do have to say that I also found some minor characters to be unnecessary. I understand the intent with having them as part of the story, representing the many kinds of people in the town, but some of them just served to confuse things. Still, to me, this doesn't take away from the impact of the story.

Content Warnings