Three reasons why you should read Anxious People by Fredrik Backman
For a very long time, I limited myself to reading only non-fiction books, mostly biographies and self helps. I was looking for wisdom and epiphanies and the sole purpose of my reads was to become better as a person. Everything that wasn’t non-fiction started to feel like recreational and if entertainment was what I was seeking, I had Netflix for that. I wasn’t looking for stories, I was looking for motivation. But soon enough I was getting bored and tired of even lifting those books about startups and leadership qualities. They started to suck out the joy out of reading which got me to read in the first place. I wanted to discover something new and that’s when a sister of mine suggested I read Anxious People by Fredrik Backman. Upon hearing the title of the book, it sounded like another self-help for people riddled with anxiety. But it turned out to be a novel about multiple characters and how their lives get comically intertwined by an attempted bank robbery. I finished the book in a week and ended up wanting to read it again immediately after having finished it. Here are my three reasons for why everyone should read Anxious People by Fredrik Backman:
1. The premise is incredibly unique
The book starts out with a tragic premise of the protagonist who chooses to rob a bank but somehow gets mixed up in an unwanted hostage situation with a group of idiotic and self-involved characters. All of them have their own issues and throughout the book their stories are slowly revealed. The suspense of whether the bank robber finally gets caught or not keeps us hanging throughout every chapter and the author makes sure that the reader is constantly kept intrigued by multiple twists and turns. I have read multiple thriller novels and by the end the reader usually has an idea of who might have committed the crime and how they got away with it. But this story in the way that it unravels the crime through a series of flashback stories, while untangling individual personal stories of multiple characters felt incredibly unique. And the climax, I promise you, you won’t see it coming.
2. Comical characters and multiple storylines
There are about ten characters in this book but don’t worry, each of them is incredibly unique and their personas are filled with intriguing flaws and as the story unravels, we get to find out why they portray such idiotic mannerisms and even as hostages being interviewed, refuse to co-operate with the investigating officer. Even the two investigating officers have an interesting story behind them as they are actually father and son, who love each other but don’t see eye to eye when it comes to solving a crime (don’t worry, it’s not a spoiler). I, especially, liked the character of Zara, a fifty year old woman who has no tolerance for people and has a very high standard for everything in life. She is not the kind of person to mingle with simpletons (in her view) and yet she finds herself in a hostage situation where her sheer arrogance and ignorance towards everyone and everything happening is pure comedy. The dialog and conversations are especially funny as they are filled with sarcasm and consistently portray the flaws of each character and their deeply rooted anxieties.
3. Masterful Storytelling
It’s one thing to have a good story but if you don’t tell it right, it’s of no use. Backman is definitely a masterful storyteller, a craftsman uniquely skilled at sewing together plotlines and characters into a beautiful novel. Even the moral messages that he inserts into his stories don’t sound like advice but resonate as meaningful experiences that real people might have learned over their long lives. One such amazing line in the story was, “You can choose to love someone beautiful and that will go away. But if you choose to be with someone who makes you laugh, that’s something that will truly last.” Such pearls of wisdom are masterfully weaved into his story. Backman’s narration throughout the books is incredibly simple and his characters are realistically complex. His story shows how we as people are full of insecurities and anxieties and yet how we find ways to overcome them and be there for each other when it matters the most.
In my search for trying to read something different from non-fiction, I found my lost love for fictional stories that made me love books in the first place. As many historians have pronounced, we humans evolved because of our ability to gossip and form stories. They have an amazing ability to make us feel a plethora of emotions and allow us to escape our realities. In this world where we are plagued by a pandemic, threatened by climate change, overwhelmed by social media and a tornado of unwanted opinions, we often find ourselves depressed, insecure and anxious. Stories like these are what give us a new perspective, they bring a smile to our face and make us hopeful that maybe we are more than what we think of ourselves or what the world wants us to be. We all have our own stories and if we look deeply enough and care enough to help each other out, this world isn’t that bad of a place after all. 😊
