Wow, what can I say? I loved ‘Beartown’ so much, I was worried ‘Us Against You’ wouldn’t be able to live up to it, but I needn’t have worried. As always Fredrik Backman has delivered a moving, heartbreaking book that will stay with me for a long time to come. Simply outstanding!

A very easy 5 star read that I highly recommend.

My full review will be posted on my blog soon.

I didn’t discover Fredrik Backman until I read A Man Called Ove last summer. Since then I have read all of his novels as fast I could, although none quite matched the magic of Ove. This is the sequel to Beartown, which had some wonderful characters but was a little but too full of descriptions of ice hockey for me. Still I was keen to find out what happened to them all after Beartown ended, especially Maya. And Benji. And Amat. And Bobo. Luckily I’ve either got to like ice hockey a lot more or the game isn’t quite so obtrusive because I was soon swept up with them all again as they suddenly discovered they were going to be the new Beartown team. Which is still the most important thing in the world to the residents, especially when the council decides their team is no longer worth funding so they’re going to have to start supporting nearby Hed. Far more violent than my usual reading, there are some stomach churning moments as the rival teams resort to their old fashioned ways of solving problems, especially for Leo, Maya’s younger brother who feels he has to stand up and be counted to protect his sister. To protect his sister from people who just can’t help themselves because they are the people who’ve been shaped by their own life experiences. And that’s when I realised why I love Backman’s characters so much. Just like Game of Thrones, there are very few truly bad or good characters. They all make mistakes and the ones who commit the worst deeds are usually the ones who’ve had the worst deeds done to them. Now I just need to find out what happens to the characters of Beartown after Us Against You finished. We are the Bears!

US AGAINST YOU by Fredrik Bachman is the moving story of Beartown, where hockey reigns supreme and everything thing seems to revolve around the hockey rink. The first story in the Beartown series reverberates throughout this book and sets the scene for what becomes an even murkier future for the town. In the aftermath of last hockey season, a new team is born and spirits are lifted, but new issues arise around every corner and in the end, the idealist picture of a hockey town is something Beartown will perhaps never be.
After reading BEARTOWN and US AGAINST YOU, I feel like a member of Beartown and my emotions are rising and falling along with everyone else in the town. Backman really creates characters that are beautiful , flawed, and real. Good choices, bad choices, and all those choices in between make everyone so likable. And even the most wholesome person in Beartown makes a bad decision and the most loathsome individual occasionally reflects goodness in them too. Heavy topics like rape, homophobia, and gang violence are covered with a careful hand, without each issue losing it's realism and seriousness each topic needs.
I hope Backman keeps writing about the people of Beartown, because US AGAINST YOU made me like those people so much more and I want to see how each and every one of them turns out. A moving book that shouldn't be missed!

I just finished my advanced copy of Us Against Them while sitting in the waiting area of a car dealership trying to not cry my eyes out. Such an amazing book. Fredrik Backman continues to be a genius. I thought I loved Beartown but this 2nd book about the town, the people, and hockey just blew me away. When this book is released on June 5 you have to read it. In the meantime read Beartown if you haven’t already.

Last year, Beartown became one of the best things I ever read. Which honestly, shocked me since I am not a sports-er. This year Backman does it again with Us Against You, a book about people, motives, relationships, brothers, enemies, love, survival...and oh yeah, hockey. I am fascinated by Backman's ability to take any character and show the spaces between the actions and the words, to make things a little less black and white. People are not good, or bad, they are people. They make choices and do things because of the million moments that came before this one. Each one of us is only a step or two from greatness or disaster. And love, love, love weaves through it all - through the grief, through the pride, through the pain. We are the bears. The bears of Beartown.

Beartown is one of my favorite books and I was glad to re-visit the town. I enjoyed catching up with new characters and meeting new ones. Beartown is still all about hockey! I laughed and cried while reading and thought it was the perfect followup to Beartown. I received an advanced readers copy from NetGalley and Atria Books. All opinions are my own.

Backman continues his saga of Beartown, the hockey-centric community that must constantly reckon with itself in the face of trauma. Don't read this book unless you've read book one (Beartown), because this book picks up where that one left off (and it will spoil that book via recap). If you liked Beartown, you'll like the sequel. Backman writes adeptly but does NOT write cheerfully - Beartown is often a very sad place to live. This series is darker than Ove and some of Backman's other work, but it is very well done.
I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This was an amazing follow up to a book I didn’t realize I even wanted a sequel to. I am, once again, impressed with Backman’s ability to draw you completely in to the story and care so deeply for the characters.

Beartown felt like a complete story, so I wasn’t sure I would enjoy a sequel. However, because I had loved Beartown so much, I did want to see what more happened to the characters. For the first third or so of the book, I was not sure about how little we were following those familiar characters, and how much time was spent on politics and new characters. I wanted to see more of Benji, Amat, Bobo, Maya, and Ana. I continued on only because I trust Backman to tell a good story.

Once I got past the rough beginning, the story completely took off (so much so that I read the last two thirds of the book in less than 24 hours). Backman made me emotionally invested in the characters, both old and new. I knew a death was coming (it said so on the first page) and over these sections, I kept changing my mind about which character I thought it would be...and I didn’t want it to be any of them (except the new politician, a Richard Theo, who I couldn’t stand). I laughed, cried, and highlighted passages in equal parts. I was absolutely absorbed.

Watching familiar characters grow made this “unnecessary sequel” so worth it. While I still could read Beartown as a stand alone story, the aftermath shown in this story (excluding the first third) added even more emotional depth. I have heard that there is one more story in this series, and while I again feel like the story is complete, I trust Backman to take me even deeper into the forest of Beartown to invest in its inhabitants.

Thank you to Netgalley for an eARC of this book in exchange for my honest opinion.

I love this book! In this sequel to Beartown, we peek back into the lives of Maya, Ana, Benji, Bobo, and all the rest who are dealing with the aftermath of the events depicted in Beartown. DO NOT READ THIS FIRST! Although Backman does flashback to the events in the first book, his retelling lacks the impact of reading the story as it happens. Read Beartown & then you must read this one to experience the rest of the story.

Backman's style is less prose than storytelling. The facts are revealed in bits with hints and blatant statements that foreshadow events. Some may find this distracting or even annoying. I find it endearing and more true to life. It's as if you are hearing the story from an old friend or relative. The emotions run high & deep. Be prepared to laugh, cry, sigh, and gasp. Yes, hockey plays a big role, but this is NOT a sports book. It's a book about human beings who happen to play and love hockey. A must read!!!

Is there a future for the small community of Beartown in northern Sweden after all that happened last season? Summer is almost over, but how should life go on without a hockey team? The best players have left and taken the coach with them. Peter Anderson, the ice hockey club’s GM, is left behind with a mess; when the club presents the new coach – a woman – this seems to be the last nail in his coffin. But Beartown is not a place where people give up, they all fight, for different goals, with different motives. And slowly a new team forms and life comes back to the community. Hockey is not all there, hockey is everything and for the sake of the game, you sometimes have to cut back your own interests.

I have read several novels written by Frederik Backman, also the first of the Beartown series which I find absolutely necessary to understand this one, and I still do not know how he manages to drag you so completely into the novel and to make you want to cry several times.

Even though in this instalment, there is not the big culminating point to which the plot inevitably heads like in the first one, you can feel the suspense throughout the whole novel. After what had happened before – the rape, the hatred, the taking sides – the characters now need to adjust their lives, somehow get back to a kind of normal which isn’t the normal they had known before. This is where the greatest strength of the author lies: he manages like hardly any other to portray the nuances in the feelings, contradicting emotions and strong convictions which cannot be explained since they have always been there and are true therefore.

His characters walk on brittle ground, any second, it all could explode and the whole community could end in total chaos. They move carefully, but sometimes also like a bull in a china shop, but they are aware of each other and especially of the other’s needs. What is so special about Beartown is the strength of the people when they are needed. They all have a good heart, the fight hard, but they also know that as humans they have to take care of each other and that life is not always fair but that they can balance the unfairness with their actions.

No, life is never easy in Beartown, many suffer a lot and you wouldn’t want to change places with them. Yet, on the other hand, what more could you hope for than a place like this small town and its inhabitants?

Again, it is a novel about hockey. But also about love and hate. Life and death. Violence and peace. Just about everything that matters. And above, wonderfully written so that you can hardly put it away once you’ve started reading.

I am usually disappointed with follow-up books, but Us Against You was a beautiful Book 2 to Backman’s Beartown, It was eloquent as it flowed graciously from one character or situation to the next, connecting everything. seamlessly. The characters became even more developed and real as the story continued. I truly could not put this book down,

I think my heart was in my mouth from the first page of the story. Beartown's story continues in this sequel, and true to fashion, Fredrik Backman makes you feel. I think he hinted at coming trouble a little bit too much for my blood pressure, but overall this book addresses such themes as family, love, forgiveness, loss, grief, and community. Even though Beartown is somewhere in the heart of the forest, the problems it faces are no different from those of any present-day society. What's remarkable is how Beartown chooses its battles and rises again from ashes.

For me to give this book a 5 star rating means that it was something special. I had received this ARC before I read Beartown. Once I realized it was a sequel, I quickly ordered and read Beartown. Both books were amazing. The character development was spot on and I feel emotionally attached to each character. I am the daughter of a football coach and sports can be both beautiful and ugly. Backman captured both sides of sports. I was sad that this story came to end for me. I am hoping that there will be another one.

The Craft
I am so surprised by how masterful of a writer Backman is. He is the master of the writing craft. I am the kind of reader who devours books, and doesn’t read for too long. If a book takes me too long to read, I am probably not enjoying it. I don’t savor reading that much. However. It took me a while to read this, because I was reading every sentence ever so carefully. Each sentence, each word of this book seems like it was put there on purpose, like the author thought long and hard about each of them. So I spent my time with this, and I loved it. Backman is so good at choosing the words that will elicit the hardest impact. And did they ever.

The Town Came Alive
This book was different to the first one in tone and in emotional coloring, but also because the town felt more alive here. It felt like a separate entity, in and of itself. It’s a character of its own, more than the sum of the rest of the characters. I love how it was handled and described. Backman uses the concept of the collective mind so well, and manages to transfer it perfectly to the page. I love small town stories, and Backman’s way of writing them is exactly what I love about them. The town has to feel alive. And Beartown always does.

Such Nuance
I really appreciate nuance in everything I read. I like morally grey characters, I like not really knowing what’s good or evil, even if I know what’s right or wrong. It’s a tricky thing to nail, but Backman does it so well. There are a lot of characters in here who don’t know right from wrong. But they are not evil. And vice versa. There’s nuance in all of the events and characters of this story and I am someone who deeply appreciates that.

As a sequel...
I think series or sequels in general fiction are tough to do. You sort of get a rounded out story in the first book and sometimes authors tend to just recycle ideas from the first book. This didn’t happen here. The story moves on from the events of the first book, but still stays deeply grounded in them. We get different problems and different plot lines, but they all stem from the ones in the first book, and they are just as connected as they should be. I absolutely loved that.

Politics!
I adore politics. I think it shapes our lives so much, whether or not we like to acknowledge that. Everything revolves around politics and money and power, and a lot of the time, people suffer for it. Backman does that really well. Politics plays a big role in Us Against You and it brings this whole other layer to the story, and adds the nuance I was talking about. And it unravels the lives of these characters, as politics often does.

He Gets It
As I’ve said in my Beartown review, Backman just gets it. He understands people and he understands life, and he transfers that to the page. All of these characters felt so real and tangible to me, and all of their problems and the way they dealt with them felt so real. I could understand each and every character and I could understand their actions perfectly. They were all very different and still. I got all of them. That’s not an easy feat.

And finally, there was a lot of talk recently about male writers writing female characters, and how they handle it poorly. I will say that Backman wrote one of my favorite female characters ever. So it’s doable if you’re not a prick. And that’s all I am saying.

I loved this just as much as the first one. If you want gorgeous writing and people dealing with real problems, and characters you can adore – Us Against You (and Beartown too, obviously) is a book for you. I highly recommend it.

4+ Stars.

No hockey in Beartown? It just can't be!

We all know hockey is an addiction in this small failing community....the ONLY thing really, except for snow, icy roads and a thick (sometimes dangerous) forest where one can hide....or discover secrets. It's still a hard life hereabouts...harder for some after the scandal....it affected so many....some took their revenge....others are still hurting....and some so burned with hatred, they now turn to violence.

In the sequel, US AGAINST YOU, Fredrick Backman delves way down deep into the soul of many a character here revealing shortcomings and attributes, hopes and dreams, loves and losses and, of course, a relationship with the town in which they are so proud....a hockey town that must survive....no matter what!

Backman, with his gift of gab, entices and teases the reader most deceptively at every turn in this second offering bringing forth many oh no it can't be moments for the reader as he describes burning buildings, lurking men in black jackets, heated confrontations and trickery from politicians that weigh heavy on some.

US AGAINST YOU (for me) was not as emotionally addictive as BEARTOWN. It was written in sort of a disjointed open-ended vein that often left me wanting to know NOW what was about to erupt . I also wanted to know exactly what happened to one character who left early on and another who takes off in the end....but perhaps that is a story for another time.

A great story....Yep! A worthwhile read....Absolutely! US AGAINST YOU has only left me wanting more Backman!

So..............do come back to Beartown and visit your favorite characters (Oh Benji))....see what some of them do (Oh My) and how the new ones fit in (Ha!) as BEARTOWN struggles for survival.

Many thanks to Atria Books/Simon & Schuster for offering the widget and early reading opportunity to enjoy one of my favorite authors via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Fredrik Backman has become one of my favourite writers, and joining him in a new book is always a pleasure. I reviewed Beartown (aka Scandal) last year and it made it to my top 10 list for 2017 – review is here – so I was very excited when I was asked to read this latest release. As with Beartown, US AGAINST YOU is a roller coaster ride of human emotions pinned around the build up to an ice hockey match – a real grudge match – but the focus is on the characters, and the town as a whole rather than a blow by blow description of the game. There is, of course, some descriptions – strategies, training and what have you – but the story of the people involved is the important part, not the sport.

Beartown is a place where hockey rules and is the reason for many people to justify their existence on this planet – to the extent that if hockey is taken away they are lost and adrift.
US AGAINST YOU is told from the point of view of wide range of characters – some of the characters are not reliable in their point of view, some who are manipulating things for their own gain, some characters have no hope and some who are seeing a light at the end of a tunnel and starting to make changes.

"Life is a bloody weird thing. We spend all our time trying to manage different aspects of it, yet we are still largely shaped by things that happen beyond our control. We will never forget this year, not the best of it, and not the worst. It will never stop influencing us. Some of us will move to different place, but most of us will stay. This isn’t an uncomplicated place, but when you grow up you realise that nowhere is"

Most of the characters from Beartown have returned and US AGAINST YOU picks up just after the traumatic events that occurred in the autumn and winter. It is now summer and the tension still hasn’t gone; the ‘blame games’ are still happening and there is an even bigger ‘us against you’ mood in the town. As he did in Beartown, Fredrik Backman tackles some very heavy current world issues such as peer pressure, homophobia, sexism, bullying, rape, and political skulduggery. The characters bloomed under his pen – both the innocent and the guilty.

“At some point almost everyone makes a choice. Some of us don't even notice it happening, most don't get to plan it in advance, but there's always a moment when we take one path instead of another, which has consequences for the rest of our lives. It determines the people we will become, in other people's eyes as well as our own.”

The Beartown Hockey Team manager – Peter Andersson – has had his whole world turn around after what happened to his daughter Maya. The only thing that got him through was his job – the team was his life. Now this has been taken from him and his life is falling apart and his marriage is on the rocks. Maya is still suffering from the fallout from her attack – her life is not a ‘happy every after’ even after the truth is made public. She depends on her best friend Ana more than ever. Maya’s young brother Leo is tired of being on the sidelines and being picked on – so he now decides enough is enough and takes action. Other characters who returned are Benji (I confess to him being my favourite) who has yet to come out of the closet; Amat and his best friend Bobo. All of these guys end up on the new team.

Adding to the mix are a some new characters – Richard, a politician who will confirm everything bad you thought about politicians and politics, and, shock horror in this women hating town (oh come on – of COURSE it is) a woman coach, Elizabeth Zackell, is hired to resurrect the Beartown hockey club. She is tough, skilled and utterly impartial as to how she treats the team members – a breath of fresh air as she treats all of her players equally instead of promoting one to the expense of the others. I loved her!!! There is also another new character Vidar, who is the new star goalie and a bit of a bad boy with a heart of gold type.

The first quarter of US AGAINST YOU is a little slow, as it is mainly setting the scene after the events of Beartown. Reminding the readers of the horrors that happened. Bringing the characters alive again on the pages, and filling us in on their current emotional statuses; some are not in a good place mentally. Then Fredrik Backman turns it up a notch and starts to layer up the new story at the same time as he gradually builds up the tension to the point where you know it is going to burst and the fallout won’t be pretty.

Confession time – while I loved reading the book and utterly recommend it to anyone who asked (note – is best to read Beartown first) – in my opinion it didn’t quite meet the dizzy heights of Beartown. I was surprised that there was even a second book as the story had seemed to be complete. I have heard that there is a third and final book in this series coming out next year, that Fredrik Backman had always planned on this to be a trilogy. It does make sense because this time I did actually feel that there were some loose ends which irked me. So I am looking forwards to visiting Beartown for one more time to learn its ultimate fate.


With thanks to the Atria Books, and the author via Netgalley for my copy to read and review.

Fredrik Backman picks up from where his novel BEARTOWN ended, bringing the familiar cast of characters back to life. He uses the hockey rivalry between two Swedish towns as a vehicle to explore loyalty and obsession, triumph and tragedy, love and heartbreak. Be prepared for an emotional journey as this bestselling author plumbs the human condition once again with his lyrical prose and piercing insights.

Brilliant follow up to Beartown. I will be staff picking this book. I cannot say enough about this book to do it justice. A must read for sure (especially if you are a team sport enthusiast).

Us Against You picks up where Beartown left off with Kevin and his family leave town while the rest of the town try to move on with their lives in the wake of Maya's rape. The future of Beartown Hockey is uncertain after most of the team and their coach went to play for Hed. Beartown ended with a flash forward to a few months which hinted at future events but without much context, Us Against You provides the context. Backman continues to explore the same themes of the previous book, like what factors influence the people kids become as adults. Whereas Beartown was more focused on the junior hockey team and the people immediately around them, Us Against You expands its focus to the entire town of Beartown. As such some characters from the first book receive continued focus (Benji), others fade more into the background (Amat), while other characters who received scant mention in the previous book receive a lot more focus (Maya's brother Leo and various members of The Pack). Backman often teases the reader about something that is about to happen at some point and even if it is what is expected it still manages to effect you as a reader. He effectively delves into the psychology of a town and the type of things it's inhabitants accepts and what they don't. While the book covers a small period of time, a lot happens although sometimes some of those happenings are a bit convenient. The antagonist of the story "twirls his mustache" a bit too much a times, yet throughout the book, you feel that the tension is about to explode and it does. In fact there are several "explosions" throughout the book both big and small. At its heart this book is about people trying to figure out who they are within the context of where they live.

Last year, I read Beartown and that was my first exposure to Fredrik Backman's writing. To say I was impressed would be a huge understatement. I've read all of his backlog now except for Britt-Marie was Here (which is on my list!) and I have loved them all, but Beartown will always be special to me. That being said - this sequel was equally as good if not better in some parts than Beartown for me. The writing was gorgeous and he has such a way with words. Following along with all of the characters in the aftermath of the events of Beartown was heart-wrenching, but also hopeful. A few of the new characters were really interesting and the political aspect of this book added a new level of intrigue. Of course, hockey is another major part of this book as well though there is a new coach this time around.

Almost all of the characters from before are present in this book: Bobo, Amat, Benji!!!, Maya, Ana, and the Anderssons.

I don't even know what to say about this book besides the fact that it is 100% worth the read and So, SO exceptionally well done. It was emotional, intense, and lovely. I cried several times and felt visceral reactions to some of the unbelievable events on these pages. I only recommend that you absolutely read Beartown first before picking this one up.

Thank you to Atria Books and Netgalley for the advanced review copy of this book. It exceeded my expectations which were already remarkably high and I can't wait for the third in this trilogy.