Britt-Marie Was Here by Fredrik Backman

The title character in Fredrik Backman’s Britt-Marie Was Here is truly distinctive.  In her early 60’s, Britt-Marie has left her philandering husband and takes a job at a soon to be razed rec center in the town of Borg, Sweden.  Like Backman’s other characters (see A Man Called Ove), she is out of practice with social niceties and yet is fundamentally a gentle soul who is pulled into the economically struggling community by her “coaching’ of the local youth soccer team.  

Britt-Marie’s obsessive compulsive traits and need to clean may distance some readers, but I found her inner monologues to be charming and laughed out loud at several points in the story.  For me, it was relatively easy to feel compassion for Britt-Marie, the team and their families.  I relished watching her grow and foster neighborly ideas.  If you enjoyed Backman’s other works or Swedish author Bivald’s The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend, don’t miss Britt-Marie Was Here.