My Friends | Fredrik Backman

Everyone has read (or watched the movie) A Man Called Ove, right? I think we all loved the way he put characters together who found out that the other was just who they needed, at just the time they needed them. Backman has done it again with My Friends, a story told in two different timelines and centers around the themes of friendship, art, family dysfunction and how creativity connects people in a profound way.

She's one of us.

We meet Louisa, a foster kid who survived a rough childhood and had recently lost her one friend. She's visiting a gallery that auctioning off a painting that she has wanted to see since her mother gave her a postcard with the image as a small girl. Louisa is driven to find out more about the painting, especially since, barely visible she seems three children on a pier. A detail of the painting that many people miss. The second storyline introduces us to four children in a small town who, at 15, have the summer of all summers. A year that shaped their lives. One of these children is the artist who painted this painting that has become world famous and insanely valuable. Ted, one of the others, is the connection point with Louisa.

Through the course of the story we learn more about the lives of Louisa and the four teens. We see both the fragility of love and the strength of it. The joy and connection of art and the pain of being an artist. Feeling the security of trust built among friends and lost within families. I honestly wasn't sure what he was going to do for the ending, but I loved it. It came full circle and left Louisa, the next one to go out and create a better world through art, within a circle of friends.

The NYTimes called is a beach read, but I think that's selling it short.