Fredrik Backman is a master of the flawed, funny, and completely lovable character. My Friends is a beautiful story of friendship and chosen family told by a broken narrator to another equally broken young girl ultimately healing parts of each other.

I'll begin by saying that Fredrik Backman is an auto-buy author for me, and I have greatly enjoyed all (four) other books I've read by him. For some reason, My Friends just didn't quite have the same effect. As expected, there were moments where Backman's charm and humor made me laugh out loud, and several moments in the book tugged on my heartstrings. But much of the book felt like someone writing in the style of Fredrik Backman. It felt like he was leaning *too* hard into the whimsy and the charm and the aphorisms, like maybe his editor had told him, "You know all these things people love about your writing? Do it MORE. Do it BIGGER." And, as a result, the plot and character development seemed to suffer. I've always loved Backman's characters. It's what he does best. And while I did care about this (very large) cast of characters, I didn't feel as emotionally invested in their stories as I usually am. Maybe there were too many characters. Maybe their characters arcs were just a little too flat. I so wanted to love this one, but I would encourage anyone who is reading Backman for the first time to maybe try something from his backlist first.

Thank you to Atria Books and NetGalley for my advanced copy.

I absolutely adored this book! It's typical Fredrik Backman. Simple writing that so acutely explains big ideas in ways that made me reread paragraphs over and over again. I fell in love with these characters, and my heart hurt for them constantly throughout this story, but, as Backman always tends to do, the ending was hopeful and wonderful. I'm constantly amazed by Backman's ability to weave storylines and concepts together. This one will stick with me for a long time, especially this quote:

"Yet the most remarkable thing about losing a parent is that you don't even need to miss them for their loss to be felt. The basic function of a parent is just to exist. You have to be there, like ballast in a boat, because otherwise your child capsizes."

Infinity stars.

I FREAKING LOVED THIS ONE!

I truly don't know how to describe Fredrik Backman's writing besides just stating he is a genius. It's lyrical, poetic, witty, heartbreaking. I mean I can't even begin to tell you how many "one-liners" punched me in the gut. The way he weaves a story together belongs in a museum right next to the artist MC's painting in this story.

Every time I review one of his books, I truly don't feel equipped to put what I feel into words. He just makes you THINK AND FEEL SO MUCH. This story revolves around a single painting, and somehow Backman brings a past and present timeline together around this painting, and makes it beautiful.

If you've read Backman before, you know that his characters will become your friends. And these in My Friends, certainly did.

Read if you love:
-Backman's writing style
-slow burn, character-driven novels
-dual timeline
-emotional reads
-the Beartown series
-quirky characters
-summer nostalgia

This is out now! I think it'd be a great book club pick this summer if your group tends to enjoy literary fiction!! Lots to discuss and pour over.

This book is truly amazing. An exceptional tale of four friends and their impact on each other through a snapshot of a few years.

Fredrik Backman's "Beartown" trilogy are books that I recommend to people on a regular basis, for its beautiful community of characters and witty, effervescent writing, and so when I saw a new novel coming our way, I knew I had to request it and dive into a new Backman world. Like the characters in the "Beartown" trilogy, Louisa and Ted all but leap off the page. They are instantly engaging, and wholly endearing, from their quirks to their faults. The tale of friendship and loss that Backman weaves around both of them, and the friends they have loved and lost, is exquisite, but also laced with such goodhearted humor, that I could not put it down. I can't wait to start recommending this one to patrons.

This was my first Fredrik Backman and will not be my last! He is a brilliant storyteller. There were fantastic plot, twists, character development, friendships, and so much more. It was also profoundly sad in so many ways but also hopeful. I would definitely recommend this one with the note that there is a lot of language and some lifestyle choices added in that I didn’t find necessary to the plot. Thanks to netgalley and the publisher for the advanced copy of this book. All thoughts are my own.

I am not sure I can add anything that has not already been said about this book. Fredrik Backman quickly has risen to one of my very favorite story tellers. I cannot think of many other authors who make you feel the characters so much you wish you were in the story and knew them. This book is moving to my favorite shelf!!

The older I get, the less forgiving I am when it comes to the toxic ways men often write women.

Because of this, I don’t read many male authors anymore.

Andy Weir, Stephen King, and Fredrik Bachman are my exceptions.

I need them to neither stop writing, nor turn out to be super-problematic.

I’m lookin’ at you, Gaiman.

I loved everything about this story. I loved Louise and Ted’s enemies to friends arc. I loved the dual timelines. I loved how everything converges into one perfect bittersweet ending.

I’m particularly in awe of how a translated work can retain such poignancy, humour and insight.

Zero was lost in translation.

The books Fredrik Backman writes are such a beautiful study of humanity. We follow the story of a group of friends two decades ago when they wer 14/15 years old and one of them was about to paint a painting that would be sold for millions 20 years later and one 17 year old girl would see this painting as no one else and would find one of these friends and learn the story behind it and behind her favorite painter.

I loved Ted, Joar, the painter (the story of his name is so cool that I don't want to spoil it), and Ali. I loved their friendship that makes for most of the story and for all of the emotion connection in my opinion. All of them have so much pain embedded in their lives but Fredrik Backman treats them with so much kindness and creates such a beautiful safety net between the 4 of them in a way that we can really feel and see their personalities shinning through. I loved all of their interactions and there are so many scenes that just broke and mended my heart at the same time. Thre are two storylines that I just can't stop thinking about it: Joar's relationship with his mom and Ted and his brother (<spoiler> The healing journey this relationship goes through is heart breaking and full of hope </spoiler>). As always, Fredrik Backman studies and dissects humanity using his characters, bringing hurt and pain to their lives, but never forgetting hope and unity. I just loved this aspect of the book.

But I did not like Louisa. I just wished her character wasn't there. I didn't feel she was necessary and, frankly, she didn't feel like a character in one of his books. She stood out, for me, in a negative way. Fredrik Backman's characters are sometimes accused of not feeling real and this is the first time that I agree. She felt like a caricature of one of his characters. She felt incredibly childish and immature especially for 17 years old.

By the end, I really liked the book but just didn't love it.

Thank you Netgalley, author, and publisher for the ARC.

My first Fredrick Backman book did NOT disappoint. I have never read a book with such amazing emotion and sadness mixed with funniness and comedic relief. The thought behind this book makes me smile. Thanks NetGalley!

I am so grateful to NetGalley for this ARC! I don't want to say too much about the plot of this book because I think it's best to go in with as little knowledge as possible in terms of how original and unique and just filled with beauty this story is. Backman's voice is wholly his own and so completely filled with heart and humor and devastating sadness, all at the same time. It's a story of love and friendship and trust and art and idiots and teenagers and soul-filling summers. I found myself re-reading pages and sentences and descriptions and taking breaks just to hold on to this story a little longer. It's magic.

I have a like/love relationship with Fredrick Backman’s books. Some I like, some I like a lot, some I love, and some just blow me out of the water. “My Friends” has me catapulting up and out of the sea. It is rare that I drop everything to review a book shortly after finishing it but this book is that good that everyone should know and be able to get a copy.

His characters are amazing, damaged, big of heart, genius, sensitive, creative, intelligent beyond their years and often hilarious. Each is perfectly drawn. They are capable of plotting perfect plans that unravel because the plotting comes from a brain that is in equal measures genius and non-genius. They are so fortunate that they can run really fast. Their adventures defy everything, absolutely everything. They are carried by their belief in each other. They are everything to each other. They became everything to me. How did Backman create this extraordinary story that grabs at you from every direction?

I laughed really hard but I hurt equally because that is the perfect balance that Backman has created. He takes so much with anger, violence and deprivation but gives so much back with insight and humor and each share space on so many pages. Excellent, brilliant, extraordinary writing with dialog that captures emotions that can rip you to shreds one minute and have you choking with laughter a second later. This is not just a 2025 favorite but an all time favorite deserving of all the stars, accolades and bravos.

A million thanks to Atria Books and NetGalley for a copy.

My Friends is a deeply moving exploration of friendship, art, and the enduring impact of our pasts.

At its heart, this is a novel about friendship…the messy, loyal, and kind that stays with you. We meet a group of teenagers who, one summer, come together on an old pier in a small seaside town. And decades later, that summer is still being felt by a young woman trying to make sense of her own life, grief, and identity.
This is a heartfelt reminder of the significance of our connections and how they shape who we become, even when they don’t last forever.

Thanks to ATRIA and Netgallery for the ARC of My Friends in exchange of an honest review.

I think is going to be hard for me to put in words how this book made me feel, but I will try my best to at least say why I ended up giving it 5 stars and why I think is one of the most thought provoking books I've read this year so far.

My Friends is a beautifully heartbreaking coming of age story that has real and raw depictions of depression, anxiety and grief. It doesn't shy away from the darkness of mental health and addiction, yet has the ability to thread those heavy topics with hope, and humor. I found myself crying and laughing at the same time. Backman has a way of writing that makes you care soooooo deeply for his characters to the point that you feel like you know them. A lot can be said of how masterful he is with threading and piecing together a story in a way that it makes sense the further you get into it. Don't get me wrong the first 25-30% of the book were a bit clunky to me. The story had (in my opinion) no clear path, but the way he unified everything in the last 70% made it all worth the while. The book like I said is beautiful and heartbreaking, YOU NEED to read any content warning there is before getting into it, but if you find yourself in a position where you can read it, please do so.


Thanks again to ATRIA and Netgallery for the ARC.

What can I say? It's a Backman book theough and through. You know by the emotionally resonant yet enduringly humorous tone. It's an experience, and I throughly enjoyed it!

My Friends is the newest book from Fredrik Backman. I have mixed emotions about it. It's very long and slow-moving, but I really loved the main characters. The story centers around an 18-year-old orphan named Louisa who is grieving her only friend, and a 40-something-year-old named Ted, who has just lost his best friend. Their lives become entwined when Louisa meets the artist C. Jat after falling in love with his famous painting of the sea. What most people never see in the painting is 3 friends sitting at the end of a pier. Louisa not only sees them, but she wants to know everything about them. Fortunately, Ted's best friend was the artist, and Ted himself is one of the friends depicted in the painting. The story mostly takes place on a train that is taking Ted and Louisa back to Ted's hometown. Throughout the ride, Ted tells pieces of his childhood and one life-changing summer with friends who became family. I loved the relationship between the friends, but the book seemed unnecessarily long.

Thanks to Atria Books and NetGalley for a review copy of this book.

Just extraordinary. I don't have the words to describe this book, but it's like every other book from this author. You will get wrapped up into the story, woven into every single word. Take your time, the book will go by too fast for your brain to understand all of the wonder and love that is put into every single word.

Loved it.

Louisa is gifted with a famous painting that is very valuable with the autograph of "C. Jat" on the bottom. Little does she know that she will soon go on an adventure with Ted and learn the history of the friends that are in the painting. Ted tells her that she spcifically has been gifted the painting because she is "one of them." She follows Ted on the train and the story unravels of the friends and the making of famous painting.

Louisa learns how these friends met over 25 years ago and how they met on a pier each summer day to escape troubles that they each had at home. She quickly gets interested in how the story unravels. She soons realizes that she does not want to be the owner of this painting and all of its history. She tries to get away from Ted and the painting by escaping the train while it is stopped. Ted finds her and she realizes that she is destined for this painting and the story of the friends. The story continues and Louise realizes that she truly is just like them and belongs to them through her love of art.

I have mixed feelings about the book. I found the story line a bit odd and slow to follow. I didn't find the book exciting and I wasn't sitting on the edge of my seat. However, Backman's character development is superb! He weaves the characters through the present and past story line very well.

Thank you NetGalley for the arc!

Firstly, as my first Fredrik Backman novel, this did not disappoint. The way that Backman writes is beautiful and captivating -- I am looking forward to checking out more of his work!!