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Release date: April 25, 2017

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Genre: Contemporary Fiction 

Blurb: 

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. 

Review: 

I’m joining in again with Throwback Thursday which was created by my good friend Renee at It’s Book Talk. She started this weekly feature as a way to highlight old favorites and read books that have already been published. I have so many older books on my TBR that get ignored in favor of review copies and I figure participating in Throwback Thursday will help me to read at a least one older title a week!

I’m going to keep this fairly brief as I don’t think anything I can say will convey just how beautiful and special this book is. It is unlike anything I’ve ever read before and I was actually super hesitant even though all of my most trusted blog buddies raved about, I should’ve known they would never let me down! I was mainly nervous because I am not a sports fan at all, ironic because I’m married to one of the biggest sports fans on the planet, but I digress. I wasn’t sure a book based on a small towns obsession with hockey would work for me but boy was I wrong. It’s SO much more than that, it’s deep, profound and extremely moving, it’s subtle and gorgeous and the language is amazingly simple but haunting in spectacular way. I will never forget this book or its characters and I highly recommend this to any reader, I truly think everyone can learn something from this one or at the very least be touched by it in some way.

Overall rating: 5/5