Humor and Wimsy Found in Anxious People by Fredrik Backman

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This book was really something! Going into it with the premise in mind, I was expecting humor, which I got, but I also got so much more.

On the surface, Anxious People is about a bank robbery gone wrong, resulting in a group of strangers held hostage at an apartment open house nearby. As the book progresses, you get to know this ensemble cast of characters who each bring their own secrets, grievances, and eccentricities to this open house. As you can imagine, none of them are who they first appear to be, and chaos does ensue.

The witnesses (hostages) were a mix of quirky, heartwarming, and frustrating. They very much reminded me of Parks & Recreation’s cast of eccentric townspeople, whose interactions with anyone they encounter are difficult, frustrating and uniquely entertaining.

The writing drew me in immediately. It felt like Backman has years worth of field notes of his observations about people: How they think, act, respond to different situations, etc. I can’t even put into words the way he authentically captures the human experience, which makes each of the characters, while different, feel so relatable. He’s able to speak to the humanity in us, and this really is the heart of the story.

I enjoyed his style of introducing info, then bringing it up again later but digging a little deeper. The story read like a mystery in that way as you try to predict what’s coming and get tossed many curveballs along the way. I’ve come to recognize and appreciate this style of storytelling in his other works I’ve read and enjoyed since. The tone here is sharp, insightful, observant, witty, a little whimsical & even a bit strange, which was so fun! Not to mention, parts of the story included transcripts from interviews the witnesses had with police officers making my epistolary novel-loving heart sing.

I related to his emphasis on how the decisions we make lead to certain outcomes, and if we had done one thing different, the outcome may have been vastly different. I believe many of us think about this a lot; all the shoulda, coulda, woulda. Especially when we’re so certain that we would have been better off if we did x, y or z instead. But we don’t actually know what that different outcome would be, do we? All we know is what we know. I’ve found that it’s best to make peace with that rather than trying to make sense of things that are beyond our actual understanding.

While reading, it got me thinking about my relationship with God and how He sees us. Backman reasons that one person out of several billion people in the world easily gets overlooked because we rarely see people as individuals, but as a collective, or as groups that fit into neat boxes. No two people are the same. God sees each of us uniquely and individually with all of our quirks and idiosyncrasies, and He loves us. It was a very touching and unexpected reflection for me.

Another theme I resonated with is about the sheer difficulties we face in life. While our challenges and experiences may not always looks the same, and while we often attach different levels to our struggles and even play the comparison game about who has it worse, the truth is we all have, will or are currently going through something. Backman’s bringing this up isn’t meant to be discouraging but to point out this commonality. In doing so, he reminds us to be kinder to people we interact with, from strangers to people we know intimately—and to be kinder to ourselves.

Anxious People was hilarious, heartwarming, thought provoking and entertaining. It’s one of my all time favorites and one I highly recommend to anyone interested in character-driven, uplifting, quirky and at times overly optimistic stories of redemption.

Here’s an excerpt of the beginning of the story that really sets the tone for what Backman is trying to accomplish:

A bank robbery. A hostage drama. A stairwell full of police officers on their way to storm an apartment. It was easy to get to this point, much easier than you might think. All it took was one single really bad idea.

This story is about a lot of things, but mostly about idiots. So it needs saying from the outset that it’s always very easy to declare that other people are idiots, but only if you forget how idiotically difficult being human is. Especially if you have other people you’re trying to be a reasonably good human being for.

Because there’s such an unbelievable amount that we’re all supposed to be able to cope with these days.

If this doesn’t convince you to pick up Anxious People by Fredrik Backman, I don’t know what else to say! I’m starting my reread right now.

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