Precious Trash

Beartown by Frederick Backman

✨Unpopular opinion✨

I found the writing very slow and clunky as he introduces many characters. It was a bit overwhelming and I felt I needed an index. I think it was too many. If can care 100% in a book and there’s 20 characters we see POVs from, I care less for each one, and the effectivity drops.

And too much telling about these characters rather than a scene to show who they are. It made for a dull read. So many tiny scenes jumping POVs, it gave me whiplash, especially because the way it’s told (omniscient 3rd person) means the character POV sections are not obvious as to who is who unless you read character names.

It appears to me as though the author thinks his readers are stupid and he has to spell everything out. Like what is the audience? It feels YA with how over explaining his writing is and the spelling it out. The repetitive nature is killing me. Yes hockey is everything, I get it. I don’t need every character to have a POV thinking this to make this stick.

So rarely is the present just the present and not alluding to more dramatic events and I find it so incredibly distracting that I never really get involved in the characters. The part that makes the book interesting is a bit too far in for me, the pacing is definitely off.

Like ya, rape is bad, you don’t need to constantly say, he will be thinking about his decisions, that Maya is going to be haunted by this, that her parents are upset. Like Jesus. SHOW US.

So many instances of scenes where there was no dialogue written and yet it’s such a Pinnacle moment. Just that things will never be the same and there’s avocados and broken coffee cups on the ground. BOOOORING. The details lack a lot, instead Backman focused on an entire town and loses any depth for me.

I think if you go in with low expectations and read it while you at a cafe and brain is set to low power, then its ok. It’s 100% a book you will have to skim sometimes. Also read it quick.

As a series it might be an okay second book, but this doesn’t stand on its own two legs for me.

This is for those that like a big picture book, tiny moments of character glimpses that show an entire town. Beartown is the main character. 

2/5

Slight spoilery post below but it shows what I mean