Dolly's Reviews > Beartown

I recently discovered the writings of Fredrik Backman, having listened to the audiobook for A Man Called Ove.

So I was thrilled to discover this story, and was even more intrigued when I saw how many great reviews it had gotten.

While the story revolves around a town that is desperately clinging to ice hockey as a way to save itself when the rest of the world seems to have moved on. The narrative is filled with the ills that afflict all society - bullying, alcoholism, suicide, sexism, competition, teenage hierarchies, parental neglect, rape, homophobia...

interesting quotes (page numbers from hardcover edition with ISBN13 978-1501160769):

"Never trust people who don't have something in their lives that they love beyond all reason." (p. 3)

"There are two things that are particularly good at reminding us of how old we are: children and sports." (p. 37)

"It's only a game. It only resolves tiny, insignificant things. Such as who gets validation. Who gets listened to. It allocates power and draws boundaries and turns some people into stars and others into spectators. That's all." (p. 53)

"We become what we are told we are. Ana has always been told that she's wrong." (p. 78)

"You might be playing with bears. But that doesn't mean you have to forget that you're a lion.," (p. 80)

"A long marriage is complicated." (p. 90)

"Being a parent makes you feel like a blanket that's always too small. No matter how hard you try to cover everyone, there's always someone who's freezing." (p. 110)

"Hockey is just a silly little game. We devote year after year to it without ever really hoping to get anything in return. We burn and bleed and cry, fully aware that the most the sport can give us, in the very best scenario, is incomprehensibly meager and worthless: just a few isolated moments of transcendence. That's all.
But what the hell else is life made of?" (p. 147)

"It's a terrible thing to have to keep a big secret from the people you love." (p. 166)

"Never again do find friends like the ones you have when you're fifteen years old." (p. 222)

"In ten years' time, she will think that the biggest problem here was actually that she wasn't as shocked as all the adults were. They were more innocent than she was. She was fifteen and had access to the Internet; she already knew that the world is a cruel place if you’re a girl. Her parents couldn’t imagine that this could happen, but Maya simply hadn’t expected it to happen to her" (p. 235)

"Nothing in the world is as small as your own child in a hospital bed. There's no justice to be had." (p. 246)

"This planet knows no greater silence than two dozen hearts after a loss." (p.262)

"Hate can be a deeply stimulating emotion. The world becomes easier to understand and much less terrifying if you divide everything and everyone into friends and enemies, we and they, good and evil. The easiest way to unite a group isn't through love, because love is hard, It makes demands. Hate is simple. So the first thing that happens in a conflict is that we choose a side, because that's easier than trying to hold two thoughts in our heads at the same time. The second thing that happens is that we seek out facts that confirm what we want to believe - comforting facts, ones that permit life to go on as normal. The third is that we dehumanize our enemy." (p. 273)

"What is a community? The sum total of our choices." (p.)