Reviewed by Patricia Simms-Reeve
The much loved Swedish author, Fredrik Backman’s latest novel, My Friends, has all the characteristics of his style which combines warmth, charm, and humour mingled with sadness and wisdom.
It presents a powerful illustration of the value of friendship and art which takes the form of the tale of four childhood friends in their fourteenth year during a summer of laughter, and lighthearted dramas. Interspersed with this, is Louisa, who 25 years later meets Ted, one of the original four. Their story and ensuing adventures with a priceless painting and an urn containing the artist’s ashes follows.
The four are C.Jat the artist, Joar, Ali and Ted. C.Jat captures the joys of that summer in his painting of the sea with a pier that has the figures of four tiny friends sitting on the end of it. However it is the sea and the light he magically conjures with paint on canvas that leads to this being regarded as a priceless masterpiece.
These teenagers have discovered the joy of doing meaningless things, to be silly and frivolous. Their days by the sea are a stark contrast to the lives they mostly face at night, at home. Violence and abuse spring from lives that are impoverished, frustrated, angry and hopeless.
The young ones have the determination to live a ‘long life, wild and precious’. Their refuge is their shared times by the sea.
It is his ability to weave witticism into his work that endears Backman to his readers. When Joar is discussing prayer with a minister and learns God doesn’t usually answer back, he is as disappointed as though he’d just learned ‘that Santa Claus was a dentist’.
Nervous Ted jumps as though someone ‘had put pins in his underpants’, and seagulls were like tourists – they ‘make a lot of noise and leave a mess.’
For Louisa, life is wracked by grief for the loss of her dear friend Fish, whose life was full of danger and desperation. She vainly searched for a path out of the cruelty of a string of foster homes where trust was an unfulfilled dream.
Meeting Ted, and hearing the story of the painting creates a bond that grows and her outlook changes. Louisa finds hope in the future and becomes aware that messiness is not a fixture.
Not only is the book hilarious, thought provoking, and wise but the plot itself is engaging from the very first. Louisa is at an art auction where the sought after work by C.Jat is the centrepiece. She is there to protest about the elites’ attitude to great art and the story grips the reader with the theme, a genuine sympathy for her cause, and the drama that immediately follows.
Minor characters, like the old woman driving a taxi, the woman with the baby on the train, the conductor there, are described with a kind of respectful warmth. It is this factor, Backman’s affection for people, that enhances his books. He can sensitively depict sadness and harsh circumstances but often relieves them with happy outcomes. He is convincing in promoting optimism and trust – trust that in even the toughest of situations, all could, ultimately, be well.
My Friends
[2025]
by Fredrik Backman
Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 9781398516403
$34.99; 423pp