Author: Fredrik Backman
# of Pages: 438 (ebook)
Genre: Adult, Contemporary
Rating: ★★★☆☆
Synopsis: Most people don’t even notice them—three tiny figures sitting at the end of a long pier in the corner of one of the most famous paintings in the world. Most people think it’s just a depiction of the sea. But Louisa, an aspiring artist herself, knows otherwise, and she is determined to find out the story of these three enigmatic figures. Twenty-five years earlier, in a distant seaside town, a group of teenagers find refuge from their bruising home lives by spending long summer days on an abandoned pier, telling silly jokes, sharing secrets, and committing small acts of rebellion. These lost souls find in each other a reason to get up each morning, a reason to dream, a reason to love. Out of that summer emerges a transcendent work of art, a painting that will unexpectedly be placed into eighteen-year-old Louisa’s care. She embarks on a surprise-filled cross-country journey to learn how the painting came to be and to decide what to do with it. The closer she gets to the painting’s birthplace, the more nervous she becomes about what she’ll find. Louisa is proof that happy endings don’t always take the form we expect in this stunning testament to the transformative, timeless power of friendship and art.
Review: This is a 3 star read that leans toward the 2 star range.
I enjoyed reading Backman's Beartown, but his storytelling fell a bit short in this one. The concept of some sort of slice of life in appreciation of childhood friendship where all they need is each other - seemed promising!
But the time skipping between the present and the past (via Louisa hearing story snippets of these childhood friends' lives together) made the story drag. Backman tried to build suspense by ending a snippet on a cliffhanger or with ambiguity and misdirection. But my expectations were subverted too many times to the point that it became predictable and boring.
The story is also too tragically optimistic to the point of being unrealistic. The characters cry and laugh too much; Louisa is meant to be the character readers can relate to while unraveling the main story, but she's overly and unnaturally invested. You're suppose to admire the bonds the characters have with each other, but Backman fails to make the reader feel like they're connected to this group of friends. It actually feels like they're a clique, and unless you're a similar lost soul who's a dreamer, you're just an outsider to this group of friends.
Not a bad read, but it was a big drag for me. I wouldn't highly recommend it.