Of course, these are based on their prior knowledge and assumptions. While people read, they build pictures in their minds and visualize characters.

Photo by kat wilcox on Identities of the charactersīut this is a novel for today’s reader, all present and correct in terms of current issues like gender politics: For instance, Backman plays games with pronouns and first names, leaving you assuming something about a character, and only revealing the gender of a person much later in the novel. In the end, it is all satisfactorily resolved, perhaps too optimistically but nevertheless, it gets sorted. It is detailed because he describes the investigation by the pair of policemen, the only police officers in the small town where it happens.īetween the often amusing descriptions of unsuccessful interviews with obstinately uncooperative witnesses (perhaps these kinds of contrarian, sarcastic exchanges are typically Swedish?), Backman intersperses flashbacks to the events in the lives of the people involved, which caused their anxieties and which connect them. Backman’s delivers a detailed account of a bank heist which turns into a hostage situation. They are all sorts – a cop, his father (also a cop), a bank clerk, an old lady, a wealthy businesswoman, someone who ends up taking a group of people hostage, and so on. This is what the characters in the novel have: angst, anxiety and Anxiety Disorder. The word “angst” is more general than anxiety, referring also to fear and to apprehension – in other words, anxiety about or fear of specific upcoming events, or a sense of insecurity or lack of confidence.Īnxious People, by Fredrik Backman (Translated from the Swedish, “Folk med ångest”, by Neil Smith publisher: Atria Books Sept. It is interesting that the original Swedish title is “people with angst”. In other words, you’re so anxious you cannot function. “Anxiety Disorder” though, is a problem which comes on a scale of six types, from less severe to cripplingly bad, and people with that condition have excessive, ongoing anxiety and worry that are difficult to control and interfere with their day-to-day activities. This being the case, then all of humanity must suffer from anxiety at some point in their lives, if not all the time. They may also have physical symptoms such as sweating, trembling, dizziness or a rapid heartbeat, in other words, panic attacks. People with anxiety usually have recurring intrusive thoughts or concerns, and may avoid certain situations out of worry. ReviewĪnxiety, according to the APA, it is an emotion characterized by feelings of tension, worried thoughts and physical changes like increased blood pressure. 2020, is well-timed, written for people who feel anxious in these anxiety-inducing times, by an author who, in the Author’s Thanks at the back, writes that he has had panic attacks, so has been anxious himself. Fredrik Backman’s latest novel, Anxious People, published in Sept.

Anxious people fredrik