A Fitting but Tragic Conclusion

In 2012, Swedish writer Fredrik Backman made his literary debut after years of writing for the Swedish newspaper Helsingborgs Dagblad and the Swedish men’s magazine, Moore Magazine. His debut novel, En man som heter Ove, was warmly received by literary pundits and the general reading public alike. Backman’s story about a reticent old man was a literary sensation in Sweden, and a year later, it was made available to English readers as A Man Called Ove. This catapulted Backman to global recognition, making him a household name. The novel would even be adapted into a film in both Sweden and Hollywood, with the Hollywood version starring no less than acclaimed actor Tom Hanks. A Man Called Ove was also adapted into a theatrical play, further underlining the popularity of the novel.

Striking while the Iron is Hot, Backman published in succession equally successful books: Saker min son behöver veta om världen (2012; Things My Son Needs to Know About the World, 2019); Min mormor hälsar och säger förlåt (2013; My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She’s Sorry, 2015); Britt-Marie var här (2014; Britt-Marie Was Here, released in May 2016); and And Every Morning the Way Home Gets Longer and Longer: A Novella (November 2016). The success of these books underscored Backman’s status as a new and exciting voice in the ambit of not only Swedish but world literature. Building on this momentum, Backman published Beartown in 2017. On the surface, the novel was about a quaint countryside town’s passion for ice hockey. However, it was no ordinary sports novel. Beartown was the commencement of an eponymous trilogy that concluded with The Winners.

Originally published in 2021 as Vinnarna, The Winners is Backman’s seventh novel. The story is set nearly two years after the events that concluded in the second book of the trilogy, Us Against You (2018). The story commences with the arrival of a catastrophic storm that threatens to inundate Hed and the eponymous Beartown, two neighboring rival towns located in the hinterlands of the Swedish countryside. The storm was an ominous sign, and the denizens of the two towns scrambled for safety. The storm knocked down huge trees and cut power to almost everyone for a couple of hours. However, its impact on Hed was more palpable. It destroyed the ice rink, which is the town’s pride. This meant that the players of Hed must seek favor from Beartown so that they could practice. This was even though animosity existed between the denizens of the two towns.

“When you’re young you believe that love is infatuation, but infatuation is simple, any child can become infatuated, fall in love. But real love? Love is a job for an adult. Love demands a whole person, all the best of you, all the worst. It has nothing to do with romance, because the hard part of a marriage isn’t that I have to live seeing all your faults, but that you have to live with me seeing them. That I know everything about you now. Most people aren’t brave enough to live without secrets. Everyone dreams about being invisible sometimes, no one dreams of being transparent.”

~ Fredrik Backman, The Winners

Historically, Beartown and Hed were fierce rivals. Both passionate ice hockey towns, their denizens have been trading barbs for years, but over the past two years, Beartown has gained headway over its rivals. This is in part due to Amat, a sporting prodigy whose talent was only discovered in Beartown. He was the shoo-in for the disgraced Kevin Erdahl, who retreated from the town after a scandal; Beartown was alternatively titled The Scandal in the United Kingdom. In Kevin’s stead, Amat proved to be a prolific player. The accolades he received made him believe that he could be drafted for the NHL. This would have been an opportunity of a lifetime for Amat. Getting drafted would provide him and his mother, Fatima, a chance to step out of the Hollows, where he was born and raised; the Hollows is the poorer section of Beartown. As fate would have it, Amat was not drafted and returned to Beartown in disgrace.

Meanwhile, the other characters have started to move on. Maya Andersson, the center of the scandal that broke out in the first book, has moved to the capital to study at the university. Her moving away, however, was a thorny subject between her and her parents, Peter and Kira. Peter used to be the manager of the Beartown ice hockey team, while Kira is a lawyer. Peter, a former NHL player himself, left the sport for good and joined his wife in her law firm. Benji Ovich, the former captain of the Beartown ice hockey team and Kevin’s former best friend, has long left town in light of the discrimination he received following the revelation of his gender orientation. He has spent the past few years traveling around the world. Bobo, the last third of the junior hockey team that starred in the first book, has become Elisabeth Zackell’s – the senior ice hockey team’s coach – assistant.

Life, it seems, has taken its natural course. Everyone is moving forward at their own pace. However, unfortunate news following the end of the storm had the characters converging at Beartown once again. Ramona, a long-time patron of the ice hockey team, passed away. Ramona was also a seminal character in the earlier books, as she was a mother figure to most of the characters, and her wisdom resonates throughout the novels. Her death was a dent not only to the ice hockey team but to the community as a whole. Upon news of her death, Maya and Benji made the difficult decision to return to their hometown. Several reunions between friends took place at the funeral. Meanwhile, Amat, after living a reclusive existence, finally decided to step out of his home and pick up the ice hockey stick for the first time since his failed venture into the NHL. The dip in Amat’s morale was exacerbated by a wrist injury that made him dependent on pills and alcohol.

Following the storm, the rivalry between Beartown and Hed started to escalate once again. With Hed players gutted and having no recourse but practice at the Beartown ice rink, old wounds were reopened. Further, rumors abound about the fate of the Hed Ice Hockey Club. Politicians – politics was a key ingredient introduced in Us Against You – were contemplating closing the Hed ice hockey club and merging it with Beartown’s club. The plan was vehemently opposed by both towns and, as if to underline the tensions between them, a fight broke out when children from Hed were invited to train at the Beartown ice rink. Will the two towns be able to settle their differences? On the horizon, a new ice hockey season was about to start, and because the two towns were isolated from the rest of the nation, they were pitted to play against each other in the league’s opener.

“We can’t fight against evil. That’s the most unbearable thing about the world we have built. Evil can’t be eradicated, can’t be locked up, the more violence we use against it, the stronger it becomes when it seeps out under doors and through keyholes. It can never disappear because it grows inside us, sometimes even in the best of us, sometimes even in fourteen-year-olds. We have no weapons against it. We have only been given love as a gift in order to cope with it.”

~ Fredrik Backman, The Winners

In the conclusion to the Beartown trilogy, Backman introduced a new element that changed the complexion of the story. There was an element of foreshadowing with the storm, one of the many disruptors that foreshadowed the events captured in the novel. This foreshadowing came with the introduction of a new character who lurked in the dark, outside the realms of the main characters. Matteo was a young man who held a grudge against hockey players. Recently, his older sister, Ruth, passed away overseas due to a drug overdose. Backman slowly built tension and tenterhook as Matteo was shrouded in an enigma. The mystery surrounding him and his sister slowly unfolds as the story progresses. As his individual thread slowly merges with the individual thread of the main protagonists, Backman slowly sets up what would be a fitting conclusion to his highly touted trilogy.

But while new elements and characters were introduced, some things never changed. The passion that the denizens of Beartown and Hed had for ice hockey remained a constant. For them, it was no simple sport. It was a source of pride that rejuvenated an entire town when it was on the brink of collapse socially and financially. For the townsfolk of Beartown, it was a means of escape from the harsh realities surrounding them. Ice Hockey was a form of salvation. However, for some, it was the opposite. It was a source of pain. However, it was palpable that Beartown and Hed only had one language: ice hockey. Beyond ice hockey, the past lingers. The burden of memory weighed heavily on the community and the characters. The characters have been endeavoring to rebuild their lives. However, vestiges of the past kept floating onto the surface, threatening to disrupt the recently established harmony between the members of the community.

Peter, for instance, has repeatedly found himself being pulled toward what he was once passionate about. To salvage his marriage, he promised to keep out of the ice hockey club. The probe into family dynamics was a constant across the three books. However, ice hockey cannot seem to forget about Peter. A random game at the ice rink showed that he still has the skills. The inevitable reunion of the characters during Ramona’s funeral also threatened to reopen the traumas of the past. For Maya and Benji, the past weighed down on them, hence their compunction to leave town. Nevertheless, they were the advocates for healing and reconnection. Unresolved conflicts and old grudges – both between the town and the members of the community – also reemerged in light of the storm. The community was united by their love for ice hockey, but it was also their lingering rivalry that created a chasm between them.

“Not the way you long for the future, for the summer, or for a holiday, but the way you long to get back to yourself. To how it was ‘in our day,’ even though that time never really existed except in our filtered memories. You long to be the person you think you were, during some sort of youth when you tell yourself that life was uncomplicated, or the man you imagine you could have been if only you had the chance to do everything again. Not longing for that is difficult for most people, and for some it is all but impossible.”

~ Fredrik Backman, The Winners

Past traumas linger, and scars run deep. The characters were exorcising their inner demons. They were trying to bridge the fractures that lie beneath the surface. It was palpable that they needed saving, and salvation came in different forms. In a way, Backman underscored one familiar subject in the landscape of his oeuvre: mental health. This was a subject subtly underscored in the first two books of the trilogy, but in The Winners, it was more pronounced. The characters had to confront the reality that they were struggling mentally. Many can relate to the characters’ plights and the burdens they were laden with. Backman, through the characters, reminds us that help is within reach if only we start to recognize our need for help. We often skirt around mental health, but the more we dismiss it, the more we suffer.

In the two years since Us Against You concluded, there were major changes that changed the landscape of Hed and Beartown. Politics has become a prevalent subject, with the third book underscoring corruption that pervades not only sports but also the community. With rumors circulating, doubts were cast on the characters’ dignity. This added a layer of complexity to them and to the story as a whole. Winning is a mantra established in Beartown, but it also has its pitfalls. Amat was crumbling underneath the weight of success and having to live up to the community’s expectations. As plans did not pan out as he expected them to and self-doubt started creeping in, he was caught amid a struggle to reclaim his self-worth, passion, and who he really was.

There seems to be no reprieve as all characters are in a constant battle with themselves. Questions about loyalty and revenge are intertwined. Corruption, the desire for power, suspicion, and betrayal all loomed. They were brewing underneath the surface, waiting for it to percolate. All of these were slowly set up by Backman, leading to a cathartic but somewhat tragic end. The novel was bookended by two prominent deaths, but while one was natural, the other was from violence. Violence reverberated across the three books, and in The Winners, it was at its most potent. Gun – an element that was present in the first two novels, hence, the recurring echoes of “bang bang bang” – took a firmer symbolism in The Winners. It was an allegory for despair and hatred.

“All children are victims of their parents’ childhoods, because all adults try to give their kids what they themselves enjoyed or lacked. In the end everything is either a revolt against the adults we encountered or an attempt to copy them. That’s why someone who hated their own childhood often has greater empathy than someone who loved theirs. Because someone who had a hard time dreamed of other realities, but someone who had it easy can hardly imagine that things could be any different. We take happiness so easily for granted if we’ve had it from the start.”

~ Fredrik Backman, The Winners

Nevertheless, the novel was riddled with glimmers of hope, which was complemented by Backman’s brand of Swedish humor. Despite the discord between the two towns, romance blossomed between Bobo and Tess. Tess was the daughter of Hannah and Johnny, residents of Hed; Johnny was vocally against everyone in Beartown. But Bobo and Tess’ budding romance was a sparkle of hope in a radically divided environment. Despite the discord, love blossoms and endures. Tess and Bobo were undeterred by the opposition of her family. In light of the tragedy, the communities come together. Connections and bonds were tested, but they were also strengthened by these events. The resilience of the human spirit was once again underscored. The townspeople start to move forward, with forgiveness guiding them toward the path of redemption and healing.

The Winners take on various definitions, the most palpable of which pertain to the winner of the ice hockey match. However, this slowly becomes moot because the novel implies that the real winners are those who learn to forgive. The real winners are the townspeople of Beartown and Hed as they learn the importance of connection and relationships. In addressing the fault lines that lurk underneath the surface, they earn their stripes as winners in life because winning goes above and beyond the ice rink. Love and friendships blossom as the characters and the members of the communities address their differences. They were tested, and they were bent, but they never gave up. Hope springs eternal despite tragedies and pandemonium. They learn. They adapt. They heal.

Beartown, then, is a microcosm of the cycle of life where happiness, sadness, trials, tribulations, rivalries, and friendships converge. There is life, and there is death. There is joy, and there is joy. Backman’s understanding of human nature makes the Beartown Trilogy soar. Over the three books, he probed into a plethora of subjects such as mental health, trauma and healing, love and friendships, and loyalty and betrayals. These novels also examined the dynamics of families and communities, the farce of rivalries, violence, the intricacies of small-town living, the complexities of human emotions, the inevitability of politics, and, above all, the indomitable human spirit. The Winners is an amalgamation of different themes and subjects that underline the triumph of humanity in light of tragedy and chaos. It is a fitting conclusion to what has been a stellar and wonderfully crafted trilogy and a soaring testament to Backman’s caliber as a chronicler of the human experience.

“The universe becomes silent. It is stunning in a way that letters can never embrace. If you ask someone who has moved away from here what they miss the most about the forest, they will probably say just this: the foreboding of winter, the still sorrow of a past summer, the autumn that seems to be only a wink here. The birds become hesitant, the lake freezes. Soon we’ll see our breaths in front of us and our footprints behind us.”

~ Fredrik Backman, The Winners
Book Specs

Author: Fredrik Backman
Translator (from Swedish): Neil Smith
Publisher: Atria Books
Publishing Date: October 2022 (2021)
No. of Pages: 670
Genre: Literary, Sports Fiction

Synopsis

Over the course of two weeks, everything will change in Beartown.

Maya Andersson and Benji Ovich, two young people who left in search of a life far from the forest, come home and joyfully reunite with their closest childhood friends. They can see how much Beartown has changed. There is a fresh sense of optimism and purpose here, embodied in the impressive new ice rink that has been built down by the lake.

The destruction caused by a ferocious late-summer storm reignites the old rivalry between Beartown and the neighboring town of Hed, a rivalry that has always been fought through their ice hockey teams. Simmering tensions turn into acts of intimidation and then violence. All the while, a fourteen-year-old boy grows increasingly alienated from this hockey-obsessed community and is determined to take revenge on the people he holds responsible for his beloved sister’s death. He has a pistol and a plan that will leave Beartown with a loss that is almost more than it can stand.

As it beautifully captures all the complexities of daily life and explores the questions of friendship, loyalty, loss, and identity, this emotion-packed novel asks us to reconsider what it means to win, what it means to lose, and what it means to forgive.

About the Author

To learn more about Fredrik Backman, click here.

Review of the Other Books in the Beatown Trilogy

Books # 1: Book Review # 521: Beartown
Books # 2: Book Review # 531: Us Against You