The book cover was LOVELY! The picture of the frozen lake and surrounding town was just what I imagined. Now, I knew before reading it what the book was all about. And ever since I started reading it, all I could think was – I really, really don’t want it to happen. I’ve grown attached to the characters faster that I could imagine. Knowing what was coming almost made me put down the book. One evening in late March, a teenager walks into the forest, puts a shotgun to another teenager’s forehead, and pulls the trigger. This, after all, is also the story of individuals with big hearts and guilty consciences, individuals cut from the same cloth as the rest of the town, but with a different thinking. In the end, you're left feeling cheated, because there is no neat end to the chain of events that started on that one night. We're given some glimpses of the future, and we know that life has gone on for everyone involved, and to some extent, it seems that justice has been served. Just not in the way you wanted.

Mrs. Erdahl is Kevin’s quiet, reserved mother. She runs a large company, where she’s seen as approachable and sympathetic, but she struggles to talk to her son, even as she longs for a closer… The party at Kevin’s house is filled with drunken teenagers. Maya soon gets drunk with Kevin, and Kevin quietly makes a bet with his friend Lyt that he’ll be able to sleep with the General Manager’s daughter. Maya accompanies Kevin to his bedroom and kisses him, but he rapes her a short time later. Amat, meanwhile, has wandered upstairs in search of Maya; hearing sounds of a struggle from Kevin’s room, he opens the door and sees everything, interrupting the assault. Maya flees the party and later destroys all evidence of the rape. Whether you're a newbie or an avid reader, here you've found an authentic community dedicated to helping you relax, learn, and embrace a very cozy way of life.I am not gonna say that I liked the violence in this book, but I definitely loved how it was presented. It got me frightened for sure. It made me feel all the helplessness and frustration of an individual who’s trying to do something against the wishes of a much larger, stronger, ruthless crowd. I have no words to describe how well written Beartown is. I wanted to cry and scream and burn this book and read it again. It made me angry, and sad, and so frustrated. But is also gave hope and a sense that – everything is going to be alright. I loved the narrative style. It was almost as if the story was being told orally, from the memory of an observer, with little snippets of wisdom and knowledge of future events which the narrator had witnessed. I’m trying to be really careful while reviewing this book. I don’t want to scare off someone who’s trying to avoid deep, sad, heartbreaking tales. I’m also usually trying to avoid books that can make me cry. But I’ve loved this one so much, it would be a real shame if I’d skipped it. Beartown begins at the end and, with an opening line as ominous as this one, you just know there’s an epic tale to be unraveled.

I also loved how the characters were presented in relation to one another. So you often get two very different people coming to the same conclusion, or two very similar people end up being very different in their essences. Fatima is Amat’s mother; her husband died in a war before Amat was born, and she and her son emigrated to Sweden from an unnamed country when Amat was a baby. Although she’s barely… As the team is preparing for a match, Amat is scouted and added to the team to give them a better chance of winning. The team wins the match based on Amat's newly indoctrinated skills. That night, Kevin hosts a party in celebration of the win at his parent's home. Many teenagers from Beartown are in attendance, and most of them are indulging in underage drinking and smoking. Kevin meets Maya, and they start kissing, which eventually leads to Kevin raping Maya.

I loved the setting; a snowy small town somewhere very far north. I both loved and hated that the country was never officially named. Loved because it gave me yet another thing to obsess over and hated because I never could get a straight answer.