Anxious People: Essential goodness of human beings

Anxious People
By Fredrik Backman

A deeply insightful tale of the frailties and the essential goodness of human beings, Anxious People will leave you with a sense of wonder and a feeling of hope that things will work out – maybe in ways you never imagined. Presented in Backman’s trademark sensitive and pithy prose, it is a gem of a book. If you have read Backman’s astonishing bestseller, A Man Called Ove (must read right away if not), you will know what I mean.

The story itself is unlikely to be like anything you would have ever read, or even thought of. A bank robbery that never actually happens triggers a situation where eight people from different worlds find themselves held hostage by the bank robber, who turns out to the most peculiar of criminals. A human drama unfolds where lives are rewound and fall open to reveal unexpected back stories, perspectives and connections.

The motely cast of characters include a soon-to-be-parents lesbian couple with quirky individualities; a wealthy bank director haunted by a 10-year-old event; a retired couple who fail to realise they are falling apart; an 80-year-old with her own secret; an actor with the rabbit head hidden in the bathroom… The eight are at a house-viewing intended to lead up to a sale when the bank robber bursts in and takes them hostage.

No houses are sold, no criminal is caught, and instead, all go home to lives changed forever.

The counter-point to the hostages held in the flat, is provided by the policemen, a father-son duo who work to free the hostages and capture the bank robber. Backman’s story meanders through their thoughts, ambitions and interpretations of what life is meant to be, and what it actually is. Blundering and tumbling through all this, the duo arrive at an unexpected victory, even though they fail to capture the hostage-taker come bank robber.

Deeply sensitive, written with understanding and compassion, Anxious People is also a didactic tale for so many of us caught in the rough and tumble of everyday life where the pressure to get the job done has us trampling over anxious people who may not know how not to be trampled.

Translated brilliantly from the original Swedish, Anxious People does not seem to have lost the nuances of Backman’s remarkable thinking. Read it for the engaging story, to laugh a little, to be comforted and just to pause a while and think of the way we are.