Us Against You by Fredrik Backman

 

Last year in July, I read Beartown, the first book in the trilogy of the same name, and I loved it. It was always just a question of time before I picked up the second book! Sometimes though, second books in a series can just not quite live up to the first book, but I loved this just as much as I loved the first book.

In Beartown, the town was torn apart by the events leading up to one of the biggest ice hockey games for the club in years. Now, in the aftermath, a lot of the players have moved to play for the nearby fierce rival town of Hed. When the local council announces that the Beartown hockey club is going to be closed down for good, the locals are disappointed.

Enter a shady politician who excels at manipulating people, mainly by pitting them again each other. He gives the club a lifeline in the form of a big name sponsor, but only if the General Manager, Peter, agrees to make certain changes to the club, which will put him in direct opposition to The Pack who are the die hard, extreme supporters who do, on occasion, tend towards violence.

Peter is a man under siege. He is blamed by many people for everything that has gone wrong, especially seeing as his daughter, Maya, was at the centre of the events. His family are receiving constant threats, his marriage is under pressure and his young son is making some bad decisions. It also seems that he can do nothing right at the club. No matter which way he turns, there will be someone who won't like it. 

Given that they lost a lot of players at the end of the previous season, the new coach, who is a woman (shock horror) needs to build a new team around Amat, the fastest skater in town, and Benjy, who long has been the heart and soul of the team. And then there is Vidar, the troubled goal keeper. 

Whilst this is a book about ice hockey, it is also a book about so much more. The way that Backman writes relationships is exceptional. Even the secondary characters can grab your heart and rip it out. In this case it was the relationship between Ann-Katrin (a player called Bobo's mum) and Amat's mother, Fatima, that really captured my heart. 

Backman also has the ability to really make you care about individual characters. Benjy is one of my favourites. He has a secret but when it comes out, everyone has an opinion. Does his ability on the ice make up for his otherness or is too much for the town to accept.  The one things that Benjy does know is that his fearsome sisters will always have his back.

I loved this quote about Benjy!

Everyone in this town knows that Benji is dangerous, because he strikes hardest. Yet few people seem to appreciate that everything about him does just that - strike hardest, beat hardest - the whole time. Including his heart.

Backman is fabulous at building the tension. You know that things are going to come to a head, but the question is what is going to be the catalyst, and what will the lasting impact be. The author has a very interesting way of writing. There is a lot of foreshadowing, some of which might be referencing things that will happen is two years or five years, so you know that your favourite characters are going to make it, but not everyone does.

Once again I was fully invested in the events that were occurring in Beartown. I have already picked the second book up from the library. I was surprised to see how thick the final book in the trilogy is! It's going to be a commitment, but I can't wait to read it and see how everything plays out!

I am sharing this review with the Books in Translation challenge hosted at Introverted Reader.

It's a 5/5 read for me!

Top Ten Tuesday: Library Love!

Welcome to this week's edition of Top Ten Tuesday which is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. This week the theme is Love/Valentine’s Freebie. I am adding my own twist because while Valentine's Day is coming up, and we do always do something, February 14 is also Library Lover's Day. My Top Ten Tuesday is therefore 10 of the 21 books I have out from the library right now. These are the books that are due to be returned soonest 

First though, I thought I would share a pic of my local library which is a gorgeous building itself inside and out.  The building was opened back in 2013 but it still feels very new. This picture is a bit old as the trees have grown quite a bit. 

The Berry Pickers by Amanda Peters - Reading and enjoying this at the moment.

Antarctica by Claire Keegan - I am working my way through Claire Keegan's backlist

Lessons in Love at the Seaside Salon by Sophie Green - I have been meaning to try this Aussie author for a while now!

Sunshine, Lemons and Sea Salt by Donna Hay - I have cooked a few things out of this already and just bought my own copy!

In the Paris Fashion by Sophie Beaumont - I have really enjoyed Sophie Beaumont's other books so I am looking forward to this one!

The Dog Sitter by Zara Stoneley - I love Sue Heath's books so now I am reading what I can from her other author name, Zara Stoneley.

Secrets by Judi Morison - This was the Rachael John's book club choice for January.

Sit, Stay, Love by Amy Hutton - This author was an author for the day in an online book group I am in.

The Golden Hour by Kate Lord Brown - I have read a Kate Lord Brown book years ago. It must be time to read another.

The Little Wartime Library by Kate Thompson - I really enjoyed the last book I read by this author!

This week....

I'm reading

It's been  a quiet reading week this week. Work is crazy busy and by the time I get home it is all I can do to stay awake! 

I did finish The Resistance Knitting Club by Jenny O'Brien which I reviewed last week. 

I then started The Berry Pickers by Amanda Peters. I need to finish it as I have two other books that can't be extended at the library! I have a feeling that one or both of those will be returned unread and reborrowed but we will see!

I announced over the weekend that I was going to participate in the Classics Club Spin this time around. The number that came up for the spin was #2 which means I am going to try to read The Leopard by Giuseppe Tomasi Di Lamdedusa. I am grateful that the book selected wasn't too much of a chunkster! Now I just need to read it by the end of March!

I'm watching

If you need a show to define feel good TV, the Muster Dogs is the show. The idea is that you follow a litter of puppies as they are trained to be working dogs. This series it is a mixture of collie and kelpie puppies. This time, the trainers are inexperienced so they are learning as they go along.

We have watched a little bit of the Winter Olympics. I daresay we will watch more over the next couple of weeks!

I did watch a Filippino movie this week, which is a first. A while ago I read a book called The Phone Booth at the Edge of the World. Whispers in the Wind talks about the same concept, which is that there is a phone booth in Japan where you can go to talk to those who have passed away. This story had a different focus as we met two Filipinos in Japan. Hannah was caught up in the tsunami which killed so many, and Ren is looking for his mother who abandoned him and his father many years before. It wasn't a bad watch, although it had a bit of a strange twist. 

Here's the trailer

Life

We did something a bit out of the ordinary on Friday night and went to see the Victorian Opera performance of Pirates of Penzance. It was lot of fun, and I found myself singing the tune of Modern Major General - cant sing the words because there are way too many!

Posts from the last week

Top Ten Tuesday: Books with Interesting Typology

The Girl from Lake Maggiore by Siobhan Daiko

Blog Tour: The Resistance Knitting Club by Jenny O'Brien

In My Kitchen: January

Classics Club Spin #43

Six Degrees of Separation: Flashlight to The Stowaway


I've linked this post to It's Monday, what are you reading? as hosted by Book Date, Sunday Salon hosted at Readerbuzz and the Good Book and a Cup of Tea link up hosted at Boondock Ramblings

Six Degrees of Separation: Flashlight to The Stowaway

Welcome to this month's edition of Six Degrees of Separation, which is a monthly meme hosted by Kate from Books Are My Favourite and Best. The idea is to start with a specific book and make a series of links from one book to the next using whatever link you can find and see where you end up after six links. I am also linking this post up with The Sunday Salon, hosted by Deb at Readerbuzz and A Good Book and a Cup of Tea hosted at Boondock Ramblings.

This month, the starting point is Flashlight by Helen Choi. I started to read this before Christmas and was on the verge of giving it up when I saw that it had been announced as the starting point for this month's Six Degrees of Separation. I finally finished it earlier this month. You can read my thoughts here.

Flashlight partially talks about the treatment of Korean people living in Japan up to the end of WWII. White Mulberry by Rosa Kwon Easton also tells what it was like to be Korean and living in Japan. (my review)

My next couple of choices are all about fruit and flower. Using the idea that mulberry is a fruit, as is cherry, I have chosen my next book as The Vanishing Cherry Blossom Bookshop by Japanese author Takuya Asakura. I haven't read this yet but I have had it on my TBR for a few months now.

Sticking with cherry blossoms, my next selection is Barbed Wire and Cherry Blossoms by Anita Heiss. 

This time my blossoms are apples as I have chosen Last of the Apple Blossom by Mary-Lou Stephens, a book set in Tasmania. 

I have two reasons for my next selection. The first is using the hyphenated name of Mary-something. The last author was Mary-Lou. Mary-Anne O'Connor is the author of In a Great Southern Land. My second reason for choosing this book? Well, when you think about the Great Southern Land that is Australia you can't get much further south than Tasmania.

Which brings me to my final choice which is The Stowaway which is once again by Mary-Anne O'Connor. That should be enough of a connection, but actually there is a clue as to why I wanted to end up on this book. The day I went to buy my copy of Flashlight, I needed to buy a second book by the publisher so I could get the little Penguin you can see in the picture. This book was the other book I bought that day!

Next month, the starting point is Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë

Will you be joining us?

Classics Club Spin #43

Just because I have been doing this book blogging thing for a very long time (more than 20 years but who's counting!) doesn't mean that I can't try at new things.

This year, I have decided that I should try to read more Classics, and so I am joining the Classics Club Spin.

The idea is that you put up a list of Classics you want to read numbered 1 to 20, the spin will happen and that is the number book that you have to read. You can find a much better explanation of the rules at the Classics Club itself, but I am sure you get the idea.

The lucky spin number will be announced on Sunday so not too long to wait to see what book the fates have selected for me. The big challenge will be to see if I can complete the read or not. 

Here's my list of 20 books

1. Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen

2. The Leopard by Giuseppe Tomasi Di Lamdedusa

3. Middlemarch by George Elliot

4. The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery

5. And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie

6. Jamaica Inn by Daphne du Maurier

7.  All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque

8. Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte

9. My Brilliant Career by Miles Franklin

10. The Tree of Man by Patrick White

11. The Fortunes of Richard Mahoney by Henry Handel Richardson

12. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

13. The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank

14. The Fellowship of the Rings by J R R Tolkien

15. War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy (finishing it!)

16.Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne

17. A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle

18. The Women in Black by Madeleine St. John

19. The Plains by Gerald Murnane

20. The Tale of Genji by Murasaki Shikibu

Wish me luck!

In My Kitchen: January

Welcome to the first Saturday of the month where I share everything I have made over the previous month. For the first time in months, I had a lot of activity in the kitchen, and I have to say I really enjoyed it!

First up I made Hummingbird Cakes to go with my Cook the Books post about Bite by Bite: Nourishments and Jamborees by Aimee Nezhukumatathil which I posted last week! I had been craving something with cream cheese frosting, and these hit the spot! And bonus, I will now be able to find the recipe whenever I want to rather than just stumbling on the bit of paper on occasion.

Jamie Oliver's Cook Book Club has taken a bit of a nosedive, so I have gone back to looking at my Australian cook book clubs for inspiration. This year, the Lamb's Ear Cook Book Club has a book of the year, the monthly cookbook and new for this year is an ingredient of the month. For January, the ingredient was stone fruit, so I went searching through my books and found a recipe for something called Chaja Cake from one of the cookbooks I got for Christmas, Everybody Loves Cake: Sweet Bakes and Stories by Alisha Henderson.  This cake (pictured at the top of the post) originates from Peru, and oh my goodness, it was so good. It is a super light sponge, filled with peaches, dulce de leche and cream, and then the outside is smothered in cream and then the sides are covered with crushed meringue. It was so good! So good, in fact, that I am making it again today, although this time I am going to use store bought dulce de leche. When I next have a gap in my Weekend Cooking posts I will share the recipe.

Continuing on the stone fruit theme, Donna Hay shared a recipe for Upside Down Pavlova on her Facebook page and so I made that too. You can choose whatever combination of fruit you like but I used fresh peaches and plums (we won't mention the blueberries that had been in the freezer for too long) and then you top it with meringue and bake it! It was another delicious recipe, although I think that I needed to buy the fruit a couple of days earlier so it was a bit riper! I actually have Donna Hay's latest cook book out from the library at the moment because it is the February book of the month. I think I am going to end up buying it!

Have you tried the viral Japanese cheesecake? The idea is that you take a tub of yoghurt, you put some biscuits in it and put in the fridge to set. When you eat it, it is supposed to taste like cheesecake. Now, cheesecake is one of my favourites, so I had to try it. We tried it with Greek yoghurt and very plain biscuits. It does have a cheesecakey texture, particularly because the biscuits soften and so are reminiscent of the base, and it doesn't taste bad, but it still tasted very Greek yoghurty. I would try it again with maybe vanilla yoghurt and different biscuits or there is a brand here that does lemon curd swirl yoghurt and I have heard that is good with Anzac biscuits

I have bought more cook books so far this year than I did all of last year! I mentioned earlier that the cook book club has a book of the year, and that is The Kitchen Diaries by Nigel Slater. My idea is that I am going to read with the seasons, so when he is writing about July I will read it in January, but I haven't kept up yet. I will try to do better in February.

The other book I bought is Arnotts: The Cook Book. Late last year I went to a book event where the bookseller was talking about the fact that there were three books that she couldn't keep in stock and this was one of them. It is a bit gimicky in that it is recipes that are made using Arnott's biscuits but there are some things in there that I will make. I think I will most likely start with Vanilla Slice but we will see.

In terms of new things in my kitchen this month, there isn't much. In mid January, we went to Perth for the weekend and spent time with my aunties and one of my cousins. Every time I go over there, my aunt buys me a bottle of spearmint milk (yum) and I get new wine recommendations. We don't drink a lot at home but I will go out and buy whichever wine we like after going over there. This time, we tried these two wines from Aldi. Given that I seem to have a bit of a peach thing going on at the moment, I particularly enjoyed the Peach Bellini wine although the Limoncello is very drinkable too

I did buy some new summery everyday place mats and table runner which you can see in some of the photos

In terms of other foodie events, it was our  meetaversary in early January. Apparently we can't call it an anniversary now that we have a wedding anniversary as well. It was 9 years ago that we first met, so we went out to dinner at the Meat and Wine Company. It was a delicious meal featuring lots of meat (naturally given the name of the restaurant) and some South African flavours. 

Last weekend we went to a new show that is on at the casino in the city. It was called Piper's Playhouse and is an interesting mix of Paris cabaret, magic, drag, burlesque and circus type acts and lots of champagne. The acts were very, very good, and the night was a lot of fun. After the show, the venue turns into a piano bar and the crowd really got into it! I think even the pianist was a bit surprised by some of the things that the crowd did last night! When I head about it, we had to try one of the desserts which was this shoe.  The shoe that you see above is actually all made of white chocolate and was filled with fresh berries and served with cream and berry sauce! Really it is just berries and cream but it certainly looks impressive.

Weekend Cooking posts from the last month

Cook the Books: Bite by Bite: Nourishments and Jamborees by Aimee Nezhukumatathil

Blog Tour: The Boulangerie on the Corner by Susan Buchanan

The Sweet Life Café by Helen Rolfe

Japanese Chicken Curry

Dinner at the Night Library by Hika Harada

Three Japanese Books Set in Cafes/Restaurants

In My Kitchen: December

New Recipes

While I am not doing the 52 new recipe challenges this year, I do still want to keep track of new recipes I try so I will add them here each month

Hummingbird Cakes

Chaja Cake

Japanese Cheesecake

Roast Chicken

Japanese Chicken Curry

Crispy Lemon and Garlic Chicken

Weekly meals

Saturday - Out for dinner
Sunday - Swedish Meatballs with mash
Monday - Baked Tuscan Chicken
Tuesday - Chicken Stir Fry with noodles
Wednesday - Pressure Cooker Spag Bol
Thursday - Out for dinner
Friday - Out for dinner

I am sharing this post with In My Kitchen hosted at Sherry's Pickings.

Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book reviews (novel, nonfiction), cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, quotations, photographs, restaurant reviews, travel information, or fun food facts. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. You do not have to post on the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog's home page

Blog tour: The Resistance Knitting Club by Jenny O'Brien

 

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It never ceases to amaze me how many little known stories there are about the events in WWII that are still being told in new stories. This is another one which features characters who share messages in their knitting and is based on a true story.

When an elderly woman has a stroke, her family is shocked when she suddenly starts speaking fluent French, her family are completely shocked.  They had no idea that their mother/grandmother who refused to leave their Channel island home could speak French. It turns out, she had a whole other life that she never told them about. 

Young Lennie Gallienne is an orphan who lives a very restricted life on the isle of Guernsey. When she received the dreaded telegram to tell her that her beloved brother is missing presumed dead, she refuses to accept it, and heads to London to try to find the truth. An unexpected meeting in the War Office, sees Lennie in training to be a spy .Of course, the men aren't necessarily happy to have a woman recruit with them. And they are even less enamoured when she uses her knitting to teach herself morse code. Her superior officers find out and think it is a great idea and so they all have to learn to knit.

Lennie finds herself working in a bookshop in Paris, helping distribute tracts and pass information back to London. Being a spy is a dangerous business though. It's hard to know who you can trust and if you catch the attention of the wrong people, it can be a matter of life or death. Even if you make it out alive, you can be left with enduring memories and guilt. 

In some ways this book felt a little like a thriller, with each chapter headed by a date and time, with the tension building and building as the time and dates got closer and closer together. 

Whilst this book is probably technically a dual time line, the modern parts of the story really only bookends the main story and form a very small part of the book. I do think that it added something even though it was only a very small part.

Unfortunately, the other thing that ended up playing only a very small part of the story is the knitting. Yes, there was a group of knitters that Lennie spent time with in Guernsey before she went to London, and then when she was teaching the other recruits. However, there wasn't much obvious knitting when she was in Paris which is the majority of the book. It feels like a bit of a missed opportunity, particularly given the title of the book.

I did find myself quite engrossed in the story very quickly. This is the first book in a series, and I am definitely intending to read the next book in the series. 

I am sharing this review with the New Release Challenge hosted at The Chocolate Lady's Book Review Blog, British Isles Friday hosted at Joy's Book Blog and the Historical Fiction Reading Challenge which I host here.  Thanks to the publisher and Rachel's Random Resources for the review copy. Be sure to check out other stops on the blog tour below.

Rating 4/5

About the Book

The Resistance Knitting Club

Inspired by the true story of a woman who used knitting patterns to encode intelligence during World War Two.

Guernsey, 2010. After a stroke, an elderly woman shocks her family by speaking perfect French – a language they never knew she possessed. As her granddaughter unravels seventy years of silence, a hidden wartime story emerges...

Paris, 1941. After her brother is declared missing in action at Dunkirk, eighteen-year-old Lenny Gallienne vanishes into Churchill’s secret army. In a bookshop on Rue de la Pompe, she poses as a simple shop girl while encoding intelligence from Nazi headquarters into knitting patterns. Each sweater smuggled to prisoners contains flight paths. Each scarf holds radio frequencies. Each mistake means execution.

Fellow agent, Harry Dennison is the only person who knows her real name. But when the SS close in, Lenny faces an impossible choice in the Metro tunnels beneath Paris – one that will haunt her family for generations. Because in the resistance, the most dangerous secrets are the ones you keep from those you love most.

Purchase Links

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Resistance-Knitting-Club-Jenny-OBrien-ebook/dp/B0FZ6F8397/

https://www.amazon.com/Resistance-Knitting-Club-Jenny-OBrien-ebook/dp/B0FZ6F8397/

About the Author

Jenny O’Brien writes complex thrillers and heartbreaking historical fiction, as well as intriguing romances. Silent Cry, initially self published, topped the Amazon kindle chart in both the UK and the USA. Most of her books have followed suit.

Jenny has over 40 years experience as a qualified nurse. She turned to creative writing as a hobby when her children were born.

Born in Ireland, she now lives in Guernsey with her husband and children.

BOOK NEWS

The Resistance Knitting Club comes out in February, 2026. A blend of Jenny’s two hobbies - knitting and reading. For more check out The Resistance Knitting Club Facebook Page. Join the conversation as well as share your crafting projects.



Social Media Links 

Twitter and Instagram @scribblerjb

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JennyOBrienWriter/

The Girl from Lake Maggiore by Siobhan Daiko

 

Young Italian woman Giulia Leone lives on the shores of Lake Maggiore in Northern Italy. Her father runs a hotel and amongst the guests are some Jewish people, including Ester who is her best friend. It is 1943 and the Germans approaching Giulia and her family come up with a plan to help their Jewish guests, but it all goes terribly wrong. Giulia is the only person to escape. She doesn't know what happened to any of them, including her own parents, and now she finds herself on the German's wanted list. 

After finding a safe house for a while, it soon becomes clear that the Germans are still determined to find her. She therefore has no choice but to head to the hills and join a small band of partisans who are lead by Raffaele, the son of the hotel manager. Raffaele resents being lumbered with a spoilt rich girl but soon he begins to appreciate her willingness to work hard for the cause. However, she is not always keen to follow orders, especially as she is determined to find out what happened to her friends and her parents, 

Lake Maggiore straddles the border between Italy and Switzerland so you can see why people would head to that area in the hope of being able to escape from persecution, and if you have a look at the pictures it looks like a gorgeous part of Italy. I was glad to see that there were moments where the characters could appreciate the views, even if it was just for a fleeting moment

I do enjoy the stories that Siobhan Daiko brings us. This is the fifth book featuring Girls and each is set in a different region and often the stories are based on true events from WWII. They aren't strictly a series given that there aren't recurring characters. I have read The Girl from Venice, from Sicily and now from Lake Maggiore (as well as some of her other books set in Italy) but I still need to read Portofino and Bologna. I think I own both of them. Actually though, my introduction was through one of her book set in the Pacific theatre of war and I would love it if we got another story from there. 

This time though, the book didn't work as well as it might have. Some of the dialogue seemed somewhat simplistic and it detracted from the overall reading experience. It could be that it is not that different from previous books but I did really notice it this time.

Will I still be reading the next book from this author. Most likely! 

I am sharing this review with the New Release Challenge hosted at The Chocolate Lady's Book Review Blog and the Historical Fiction Reading Challenge which I host here.

Rating 3.5/5