Review – Things My Son Needs to Know About the World by Fredrick Backman

Seeing as I read mostly speculative or historical fiction, this was something of a departure for me, so maybe you can factor that into the review somehow. Anyway, when I saw the title pop up on Netgalley, I decided to give it a go. After all, I have a young son, and Fredrik Backman is a well known author with a sizable following, so what could possibly go wrong? Well nothing really. The book was…fine. Not amazing, and certainly not awful. It was about as okay as a book can get. Essentially, the book is what is says on the tin – the author wants to impart some wisdom to his infant son, who by the end of the book appears to be about 18 months old. This is not unusual to most of us dads who aspire to be non-deadbeats, even though we’ll spend most of our time trying to prove we’re at least aiming to be competent..

So, back to the book. It’s a series of anecdotes about his life experience as a dad and before that at times are freakin’ hysterical. Not just hysterical, but FREAKIN’ hysterical. They are rather random, like on soccer, politics and love and so forth, and some really hit the point, but maybe not in the way you’d expect (particularly the soccer one), and I’m sure each one will touch us differently.

So far, it probably seems like I loved it, but here’s the rub – the constant humorous rants can get a get tiring at times. You know when you’re out or at work or whatever, and someone says something so funny, we nearly poop ourselves laughing? Then the person says something that might pass for funny at the appropriate state of inebriation, and we offer a fake chuckle, then look around without trying to catch the person’s eye? The person now believes they are “on a roll” and starts spewing gibberish, and none of us has the guts to tell the person to stop? Know what I mean? That’s what I felt like at times when reading this. It’s a shame, because the author is funny and a fine writer, but I think he could have hit the “poignant” button a little more.

So to sum up, it’s a good read, funny, and the final anecdote when he tells the reason for this book might make you forgive his occasional rant. Somewhere between 3 and 3.5 stars.