The Buy 2 Get 1 Free table at Barnes & Noble will be by downfall. It is for me like putting an ice cream shoppe next to a weight loss center...temptation too hard to resist.
That is where I picked up A Man Called Ove. And it was love from the first sentence. I will now be seeking out more of Backman's writing, the style is just so darn readable. It is snarky, and funny, and heartwarming, and heartbreaking. It is easy to get lost in the pages and feel like you have truly entered the lives of the people in the tale.
And then there is the story itself. Ove shouldn't be someone you like but you will love him. The way the story unfolded reminded me of The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry, in that the story of the main character's past, how they got where they are now, unfolds as part of the present story and is told in little bits through out, slowly and wonderfully revealing important details and shedding understanding on who this character really is. I really enjoy this method of story telling.
The story of Ove and his neighbors will break your heart at time, it will make you angry, it will make you laugh, and you will miss them when you close the book for the last time. Theirs is a story of love and loss, of redemption and healing, of life with all its bumps and bruises. Ove learns the value of hard work and honesty at an early age and who he is as shaped by his childhood colors how he lives as an adult, but love can make that softer, but so can loss and those who come to fill our voids. He learns from the people he least expects or wants to learn from that living is hard but worth it.
(Finished July 2, 2017)
No comments:
Post a Comment