Beartown by Fredrik Backman

The #1 New York Times bestselling author of A Man Called Ove returns with a dazzling, profound novel about a small town with a big dream—and the price required to make it come true.

People say Beartown is finished. A tiny community nestled deep in the forest, it is slowly losing ground to the ever encroaching trees. But down by the lake stands an old ice rink, built generations ago by the working men who founded this town. And in that ice rink is the reason people in Beartown believe tomorrow will be better than today. Their junior ice hockey team is about to compete in the national semi-finals, and they actually have a shot at winning. All the hopes and dreams of this place now rest on the shoulders of a handful of teenage boys.

Being responsible for the hopes of an entire town is a heavy burden, and the semi-final match is the catalyst for a violent act that will leave a young girl traumatized and a town in turmoil. Accusations are made and, like ripples on a pond, they travel through all of Beartown, leaving no resident unaffected.

Beartown explores the hopes that bring a small community together, the secrets that tear it apart, and the courage it takes for an individual to go against the grain. In this story of a small forest town, Fredrik Backman has found the entire world. @goodreads 

Late one evening, toward the end of March, a teenager picked up a double-barreled shotgun, walked into the forest, put the gun to someone else's forehead, and pulled the trigger.

This is the story of how we got there.

At first I wasn't really getting into this book. I don't know why because:

1) I love the author
2) I love hockey
3) I love coming of age stories
4) I love the cold
5) I love small towns. I was born in one.

It finally got to where I liked it enough to change stars from 3 to 4. Although, I really wish for a better ending. Don't get me wrong, it was a great ending. . . I just wanted....... something else to happen. Uggg, I can't say because you will know. Let me just say I wouldn't haven't walked away and maybe those that have read it will know what I'm talking about.

This whole little community of Beartown is nothing but hockey baby.







And a lot of these boys are pretty bad @ssed on the ice! I mean they are going somewhere, maybe not where they want to go.

There are a lot of characters in the story. Some I hated more than life (one in particular) and others I liked. I can't keep them all straight and I didn't write them all down. Damn.

Benji
Kevin
Amat
Maya
etc and so on.

these kids are all different ages and of course everyone in the town knows each other. A lot of them have been there since the ice age. And there is nothing wrong with that.

It's not just about hockey, although most of it is, but it's about them growing up with hockey, how they feel. There are adults that having issues. There is a terrible attack in the town that throws everyone out of kilter. To me that was simple, red hot poker people, red hot poker.

To me, I think this would have been a nice place to live if it wasn't one of those places where the sport is more important than a human life so to speak. I can't say more. Otherwise, the close knit community is a great thing.

I wish I could have loved it to death like everyone else on the face of the planet but I thought it was good enough.


Welcome to Beartown.

GOODREADS REVIEW:

 https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2016798071