OT: a book worth reading

[huskyd]

After months of therapy and medication, I feel almost well enough to get back to WCBB. In the interim, I read a book entitled “Beartown” by Fredrik Backman and have to recommend it to BYers interested in a great, sports-centered read. Backman is a Swedish writer, and “Beartown” is set in a very small rural town. The town is dying. Its salvation may be in an outstanding local hockey team. The book explores the meaning of sport, what it is and isn't, how it inflates and depresses. It examines everyone involved: players, coaches, sponsors, parents, friends. The book is riveting, difficult to put down.

I recommend this book because it touches on virtually all of the topics that we explore on this site. What does it mean to love a team? How does the team's success (and, gasp, failure) impact lives? What's in it for everyone? Why do some hate it?

To paraphrase from the book: Explaining to someone why a sport is so loved is impossible to do. Either you get it or you don't. Then for more than 400 pages, Backman tries to explain it anyway.

See you in October.

 

[bags27]

Thanks for the recommendation, huskyd! I just downloaded it to my kindle.
Glad to know you're on the mend. Get better and better everyday.
See you in October to celebrate this monster team in the making....

 

[Scud49]

Thanks Huskyd - I'll check it out, always like a good book - and good to hear you are on the "rebound"

 

[tomcat]

Sounds well worth reading. Thanks. Meanwhile, glad you're feeling better. Keep it up.

 

[huskyd]

Thanks for the well-wishes for my health, but there's nothing wrong with me! I guess I was too subtle in describing my "recovery" to the loss in the Final Four. Now I feel stupid (wife says I should). Anyway, glad you're all still around. Look forward to the ultimate panacea, which is an undefeated season by perhaps the best UConn team ever . . . Apologies.