An amazing read

Beartown, Fredrik Backman’s latest novel, takes place in a remote, on the skids, small Swedish town whose people are hoping that their junior hockey team might bring them national glory and with it an economic revival. All is going great until suddenly a terrible incident changes everything, not only shattering the dream but also tearing the community apart.The book is set in a quaint town in Sweden whose residents organise their lives around the town’s biggest asset – their hockey team. Beartown is old-fashioned in its values and not necessarily progressive in its actions, then, one day an unforgivable act is committed; hidden in a forest, and cut off from the fast-paced world around it, when Beartown is faced with an important decision, does it choose to believe the truth, or stay silent, knowing that if a horrendous crime has taken place, it will affect those involved for the rest of their lives?

Firstly, this book was amazing and stayed with me for a while after I read it. It raises so many questions about how people live, and how they treat those around them. Maya’s story was heartbreaking but, unfortunately, all too familiar, a fact Backman does not steer away from.
Right from the start, this book raised so many questions about the society we live in, and the way we choose to react when other people stand accused. With so much truth being vocalized in society at the moment and the #MeToo movement, this book does what other books are sometimes afraid to do – show us how ugly, and grossly negligent we can become in order to save face, and to avoid admitting something we’d rather not admit: that even those we love are capable of horrendous acts. Backman doesn’t pretend that every wronged person will always achieve justice, but what he does not let the reader forget, is that the guilty are guilty no matter their gender, wealth, talent, or age, and we must endeavor to never let the truth remain hidden
In sports and life what we hope our children learn is to make good choices in a very un-ideal world. Fiction is a way to enter into an age-old discussion framed so beautifully by one of the characters: "This town doesn't always know the difference between right and wrong...but we know the difference between good and evil." What is the right thing to do when things go very wrong? You'll be compelled to find your answer. Backman is the Dickens of our age, and though you'll cry, your heart is safe in his hands.