Peace In The Margins

“Late one evening towards 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.”

When a story holds your soul prisoner, words will never have the ability to adequately express why – that story for me is Beartown. I fell in love with the quirky candidness of Fredrik Backman’s A Man Called Ove and knew I needed to read more of his works. Little did I know the characters, the town, that hockey itself as it relates to human nature and the devastatingly flawed expectations we have of those closest to us would so deeply impact my worldview. Backman is quickly rising in my top favorite authors list.

This is only my second read of Backman’s, but from podcasts and other book reviews I understand how his writing in Beartown is different than his previous works. Regardless, I want all the Backman!

This book took me a while to pick up; you see, I don’t really care for sport-themed books. Yet, I kept hearing Beartown talked about on podcasts and reading blogger mentions of the book, and of course, Goodreads continued to “recommend” it to me.  Over and over in review after review I was told, “This is NOT a story about hockey, but one that takes place around hockey.” I bought in and finally picked it up…and you know what? I couldn’t put it down!

“This town needs to win at something. We need to feel, just once, that we’re best. I know it’s a game. But that’s not all it is. Not always.”

At the core of Beartown is hockey. It defines the community – who they are: winners or losers. Additionally, Backman asks: what does the hockey culture look like – how does humanity respond inside this world?

“We love winners, even though they’re very rarely particularly likeable people. They’re almost always obsessive and selfish and inconsiderate. That doesn’t matter. We forgive them. We like them while they’re winning.”

“When you can accept the worst aspects of your teammates because you love the collective, that’s when you’re a team player.”

“Community is the fact that we work toward the same goal, that we accept our respective roles in order to reach it. Values is the fact that we trust each other. That we love each other.” David thought about that for a long while before asking: “What about culture, then?” Sune looked more serious, choosing his words carefully. In the end he said: “For me, culture is as much about what we encourage as what we actually permit.”

“…most people don’t do what we tell them to. They do what we let them get away with.”

And Beartown allowed the hockey team they were depending on for town sustainability to get away with a terrible act. Friends and family pitted against one another; a community that stood with pride behind a hockey team would embark on a civil war over a violated teenager. Beartown fostered a culture of Us Against You (this is the title of the Beartown sequel – btw).

“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. There are many ways of doing that, but none is easier than taking her name away from her.”

And that’s exactly what Beartown did – a line was drawn and you were either on the side of the rising hockey star or the victim – and the side on which you resided also defined what it meant to be a victim.

The resolution will shock you – because you know, it all ended with a double-barrel shotgun to the head.

But a profound reality is uncovered…

“What you create, others can destroy. Create anyway. Because in the end, it is between you and God. It was never between you and anyone else anyway.”

I refuse to unveil spoilers inside this gem – but I will tell you, you may not be all that satisfied with the final outcome…unless…

…there’s always the sequel!

Highly recommended – Unsolicited Review.

Until next time,

Alicia