Name: Beartown
ISBN: 9781531156923

Perfection Learning Corporation

Beartown

Alina

“You can’t live in this town, Maya, you can only survive it.”

Neither of them has any idea just how true that is.

Why does Kira care about hockey? She doesn’t. She cares about a person who cares about hockey. And because she dreams of a summer—just one—when her husband can look his town in the eye without lowering his gaze.

That’s why he doesn’t see his team the same way everyone else does, because even if Kevin is the best player he isn’t always the most important.

Kevin might be the star, but Benjamin Ovich is the heart of the team. Because Benji is like David: he’s prepared to do whatever it takes. So ever since he was small, the coach has drummed one single idea into him: “Don’t pay any attention to what people say, Benji. They’ll like us well enough when we start winning.”

She’s a single mother with three daughters, but it’s this seventeen-year-old boy who worries her more than anything. A boy who cares too little about the future and frets too much about the past: nothing could depress a mother more. Her little Benjamin, the fighter with whom it’s far too easy for the girls of Beartown to fall in love. The boy with the most handsome face, the saddest eyes, and the wildest heart they’ve ever seen. His mom knows, because she married a man who looked just the same, and nothing but trouble lies ahead for men like that.

The other guys keep warning him he’ll get kicked off the team if David finds out he smokes weed, but Benji just laughs, secure in the knowledge that would never happen. Not because Benji is too good to be thrown off the team, definitely not, but because Kevin is too good. Kevin is the jewel, Benji the insurance policy.

All organizations like to boast that they’re building a culture, but when it comes down to it everyone really only cares about one sort: the culture of winning. Sune is well aware that the same thing applies the world over, but perhaps it’s more noticeable in a small community. 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.

Of all the things in the world you can be envious of your best friend for, this is what Kevin would most like to have: the ability that Benji has always had to not give a shit about anything, and to get away with it.

Say what you like about Beartown, but it can take your breath away. In a single second.

A simple truth, repeated as often as it is ignored, is that if you tell a child it can do absolutely anything, or that it can’t do anything at all, you will in all likelihood be proven right.

Apart from the fact that Benji never has his own tobacco, it would be hard to find a better friend.

Ramona pours herself a glass of whisky. Breakfast is, after all, the most important meal of the day.

There are plenty of things that hurt people without people ever really knowing why. Anxiety can act as internal gravity, shrinking the soul. Benji has always been good at falling asleep and bad at actually sleeping.

He buries the butt of his joint in the snow, then stands among the trees with his eyes closed and contemplates turning around and walking back the way he came. Away from all this. Then maybe steal a car and leave Beartown in the rearview mirror. He wonders if that would make him happier.

Even then, Benji was the most courageous little bastard David had ever seen, and Kevin the most talented.

Zacharias will never ask Amat if he forgot about him or simply didn’t care. But one of them goes, and one stays behind. And nothing will ever be quite the same again.

Kevin opens his mouth but stops himself when he sees Benji disappear through the front door. He looks almost as disappointed as the girls in the kitchen and Ana do.

But not Benji. They fall for him for completely different reasons. He’s got something everyone wants, something completely independent of anything he does on the ice. His eyes always let you know that he could leave you any moment if he felt like it, without so much as a backward glance. He isn’t tied to anything, he just doesn’t care. Kevin is terrified of loneliness, but Benji embraces it as a natural state. All through their childhood Kevin has been scared that one day he’ll wake up and discover that the other superhero is gone. That this friendship never meant anything to him.

Benji’s blood is different from other people’s.

Kevin can’t help thinking that Benji is the only truly free individual he knows.

Kevin likes the fact that she’s different. That her eyes never quite stop moving, that she’s always watching. That she seems to know who she is. He wishes he could be like that.

This town can go to hell. Every single one of them are disgusting I can’t believe they can act like this. The characters are all pricks, they turn a blind eye to a girl who’s come to them for help, a four year old child who has bruises all over her body. What do they do? Ignore it. Because apparently this sort of thing should be dealt with internally. This book was so good man I can’t. Frederick Bachman is what sally rooney aspires to be. He’s so underrated, his books are amazing and every chapter in this book broke my heart and made me cry so so much. I hate Kevin. we feel bad for him initially, because we see how tough his life was. But what he did was disgusting. Thank God for Amat. I love Amat and Zachariah. Bachman is a literary genius and needs to be hailed as such at all times. 

He just commented on our disgusting culture as a society within a four hundred page book. 

surtified™

This town can go to hell. Every single one of them are disgusting I can’t believe they can act like this. The characters are all pricks, they turn a blind eye to a girl who’s come to them for help, a four year old child who has bruises all over her body. What do they do? Ignore it. Because apparently this sort of thing should be dealt with internally. This book was so good man I can’t. Frederick Bachman is what sally rooney aspires to be. He’s so underrated, his books are amazing and every chapter in this book broke my heart and made me cry so so much. I hate Kevin. we feel bad for him initially, because we see how tough his life was. But what he did was disgusting. Thank God for Amat. I love Amat and Zachariah. Bachman is a literary genius and needs to be hailed as such at all times. 

He just commented on our disgusting culture as a society within a four hundred page book. 

Hannah Simpson

sani

5/5 bro this book was a rollercoaster evervone and their dads should read this bcs it made me understand the nature of men and at the same time made me feel heard as a woman like it's so mind blowingly eye-opening and honest and evervone was so deeply flawed and alive and now i have a tiny spark of hope for humanity

kamilia

5/5 bro this book was a rollercoaster evervone and their dads should read this bcs it made me understand the nature of men and at the same time made me feel heard as a woman like it's so mind blowingly eye-opening and honest and evervone was so deeply flawed and alive and now i have a tiny spark of hope for humanity



This book is well and truly a masterpiece! I’m so glad that Sofie recommended this one to me for my 12 books in 12 months challenge, whilst simultaneously feeling sad I hadn’t read it way sooner.

Admittedly, I was nervous going into this book as the blurb had me thinking this had thriller-y vibes but man I was so so wrong

This book has everything, it has hockey, community, family, friendship and teamwork. I felt overwhelmed by the amount of characters I was introduced to at the start that I had to write them down on a notebook as a mini glossary as well as how they were all connected 😂 but I came to love almost all the characters - Benji forever has a special place in my heart!

I enjoyed that each chapter flipped through multiple characters’ POV’s, as it kept the story moving, but most importantly, it made me feel like I was seeing each moment through all of their eyes, seeing their reactions instantly and feeling everything as they feel it.

This is definitely a book I will be recommending for a very long time and one that has truly left it’s mark on me in the best way 🤍

Larissa Kirchberger

BOOK REVIEW

Bear Town / Fredrik Backman

Rating ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

This book is well and truly a masterpiece! I’m so glad that Sofie recommended this one to me for my 12 books in 12 months challenge, whilst simultaneously feeling sad I hadn’t read it way sooner.

Admittedly, I was nervous going into this book as the blurb had me thinking this had thriller-y vibes but man I was so so wrong

This book has everything, it has hockey, community, family, friendship and teamwork. I felt overwhelmed by the amount of characters I was introduced to at the start that I had to write them down on a notebook as a mini glossary as well as how they were all connected 😂 but I came to love almost all the characters - Benji forever has a special place in my heart!

I enjoyed that each chapter flipped through multiple characters’ POV’s, as it kept the story moving, but most importantly, it made me feel like I was seeing each moment through all of their eyes, seeing their reactions instantly and feeling everything as they feel it.

This is definitely a book I will be recommending for a very long time and one that has truly left it’s mark on me in the best way 🤍