While I haven’t read the previous books in this series for as much as I tried to make space before this one publishes, I felt like it can be read as a standalone but definitely I’m missing some parts.

The author is a master for crafting a well-drawn characters and the descriptions of the settings just take you there in the middle of it all in seconds.

This story talks so much about the human side of a community that has gone through a storm and some unpredictable events like the death of one of them.

The intrigue is set high when it comes to politicians wanting to get away with their plans of changing the town and take advantage of its new modern state.

All those decisions will, of course, change the way the community lives and reactions are everywhere, some peaceful, some not so much. And the fire gets bigger when rivalry and greediness separate families and friendships.

The narrators are so good at showing their emotional turmoil while going through those actions and the story itself.

I enjoyed their human side, whether it was bad intention or protective, and I just enjoyed this story overall.

“You get success by having extremely high integrity but absolutely zero prestige. Because integrity is about who you are, whereas prestige is only about what other people think of you.”

Two years have passed since the events that no one wants to think about. Everyone has tried to move on, but there’s something about this place that prevents it. The residents continue to grapple with life’s big questions: What is a family? What is a community? As the locals of Beartown struggle to overcome the past, great change is on the horizon.
So what are the residents of Beartown willing to sacrifice in order to protect their home?
Everything.

It is no secret that I love Fredrik Backman’s books. I’ve read every single one of them and each one is unique and special. His latest-Winners- wraps up the Beartown trilogy which, I can’t deny is one of my favourites among all his books.

To say I was overwhelmed with emotion could not possibly encapsulate the gamut of emotions I felt towards the end of the book. Knowing this was the last one, I spent nearly two weeks reading it, savouring it slowly, patiently, which is most unusual for me. The hardest was to let go, say goodbye to all the characters and yet know they will remain with me, with all their experiences.

This book, this series, is more than a story. It is comfort, it is love, it is pain, and it is the promise of sunshine and miracles – the only two things to keep the world going.

This ARC courtesy of NetGalley and Simon and Schuster UK.

The Beartown series has been one of the most addictive, gripping and engrossing series that I’ve read in a long time!

I have such a huge love for the characters of the series and their growth across the 3 books was beautifully written. Backman drops a bombshell about one of my most beloved characters on the very first page which made this last book that much more emotional and riveting.

I am such a fan of the way Backman uses the repetition of words and poignant sentences in the series to either create tension or drive a point home.

The imagery is brilliant throughout and I had such a vivid image of the devastation caused by the storm in The Winners. It was interesting that we got introduced by name to some of the characters in Hed in this book. This felt important as the previous two books only referred to those outside of Beartown by description of clothing or role.

I loved this instalment in the series and am sad to say goodby to Beartown. For me, the pacing was a little bit too slow in the first half and didn’t have the same ‘must keep reading’ feeling that I had from start to finish in the first two books.

Fredrik Backman is now counted among my favourite authors and I can’t wait to read his future releases.

“If nobody knows who you are, you can be whoever you want to be.”

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Disclaimer: for me this book was a 2⭐️ right up until the last 10%. Then wow did it hit me hard! I don’t think I’ve sobbed at a book as hard for a while!

The Winners begins two years after Us Against You, when it aludes to the death of one of the main characters. The story begins with Maya and Benji travelling back to Beartown for the funeral and for a good quarter of the book I really couldn’t work out who had died. Then it hit me.

The story focuses on the funeral, a huge storm that destroys Hed’s ice rink and the politicians trying to turn Beartown and Hed into one hockey team.

Massively heartwarming and equally heartbreaking, The Winners is a compelling follow-up to a story that is close to many of our hearts, and this final instalment is sure to resonate with you.

At 600 pages long, the weight of this book may feel quite daunting. But Backman's writing is so absorbing that you will easily fly through it. And every page is absolutely made the most of, with complex developments expertly weaved together to explore the emotions, worries, and hopes of so many different characters.

I would suggest that read the other books before getting to this one as there are a lot of characters, and your enjoyment of this book does depend on how much you have grown to get to know and love them over the previous two books. So if you go into this as a standalone, there will be a lot that you're missing out on, and I fear it would be far too confusing.

But fans of the series are sure to love this latest instalment and it's brilliant to return to some of my favourite fictional characters. There's a lot of love in this book, but there's also a lot of hate, as Backman takes you on an emotional journey that is sure to leave a scar.

I was super excited for a new Fredrik Backman book, and super excited to invest my soul once again into Beartown and its amazing characters.

However, with the book practically starting with foreshadowing doom, I found it difficult to really get too carried away. Additionally, the aspects that made me fall in love with Beartown and its inhabitants almost felt a little forced or unnatural at time. I wanted to be taken by surprise by the emotions I felt, to be in awe how someone’s actions have such a deep impact on situations and people (and of course myself as the reader), but this time around it just felt par for the course.

Having said that, Backman’s writing still had the ability to make my heart break or overflow, to bring me to tears or laugh with joy (mostly on a public train), and for that my fondness for Beartown could never be diminished.

The first installment, Beartown grabbed my attention with perfecr combo between amzing storytelling and emotional-stirring contents. The type of plot that looks so ordinary but has lasting aftertaste. Does this sequel also give the same effect?

In The Winner the story takes time 2.5 years depicts the last scandal in Beartown. The book starts strong, and some characters's development getting dug deeper. We will know their personal struggles, their capabilities and other side we never realized before. The author also add several new names to the mix and ofcourse it will add extra dramas in Beartown and Hed. Some snippets did great and hit the mark to stirring emotions. Although the story seem "busy" but the pace of plotline is very slow. For me personally, almost half of this book feels dragged and very repetitive. Overall, i like sport from small town premise and I really love morals story author tried to share but I still thought that Beartown will punches stronger if it become standalone.

Thank you Netgalley and Simon & Schuster UK for provided me with this gifted copy. Really appreciates and my thoughts are my own.
BN review under Alexa Ayana name.

Frederik Backman has a unique writing style, his stories are told through an apparent cacophony of characters, but who actually interlock like the pieces  of a puzzle.

Beartown centres around the success of its hockey team, but the cracks below the surface of the community are papered over with hockey flags!

I found this book a little depressing and the sport politics was quite lengthy and complex, so I didn't enjoy this book as much as his other more lighthearted titles. However, it is a very clever story and the way that the characters  were all connected is really interesting. It is a long book, but well worth persevering and the storyline gets quite intense in the last few chapters!

Just stunning!

I have not read the first two parts of the trilogy so was a bit worried I would not make sense of everything but I think it worked well as a stand alone. The stories of others are reviewed enough that I had a clear idea who what had happened before.

I absolutely love the writing style, there is such peace and calmness about it even when the topics discussed are harrowing.

There are so many characters but I didn’t get confused and I loved them all. Good and bad they were relatable.

A story of family, small towns, ambition, loneliness, sadness and hope. An absolute triumph!

In a small town where sport and loyalty to your team is everything, what happens in the aftermath of a scandal.
This is the final book in the Beartown trilogy and it’s beautifully written. So many lives are opened up to the reader and it's rare that an author can make you want to weep for victims on both sides. And yet the story is not without humour, it’s perfectly balanced.
Absolutely blown away by the amount of emotion and energy that Fredrik Backman has managed to generate within these pages.

The Winners is the last book in the Beartown trilogy and what a book it is.

I’m no hockey fan but this trilogy about the two neighbouring towns of Hed and Beartown and the residents who live within grabbed my heart. I felt their happiness and their pain and held my breath as their stories unfolded.

This final book was lonnnnnng at a hefty 700 pages, but Backman kept my attention throughout. It started slowly and then built and built until the explosive ending, where the last few chapters had me ugly crying. Simply wonderful and I’d like to thank Netgalley and the publisher for this arc in exchange for an honest review.

This is such a wonderful novel. The third in the 'Beartown' trilogy. I adored the characters and seeing their small victories and crushing lows. They're absolutely perfect. Backman has a way of showing people in all their messy glory. I loved the insights into the characters as they deal with the events from the previous 2 years.
Backman has a wonderful way of describing relationships; couples, friends and especially those feelings we all have as parents. I felt my heart ache at times with the way he explains those conflicted emotions like poetry.
The two towns of Beartown and Hed almost become characters themselves and I enjoyed how the tension between them developed in this novel.
Although this was a fascinating insight to the various inhabitants of the two towns, I found this novel was a bit long and I genuinely think a lot of it could have been cut out just to help the narrative flow a bit faster. This would have been a 5 star book if it hadn't felt so repetitive.
Thank you so much to Netgalley and the publishers for providing me with an arc in return for an honest review.

Sorry. I made the mistake of not checking if the book is the first book or a sequel. So, I cannot review it properly. Won't happen again!

I didnt hugely enjoy this. It just wasn’t my kind of book really. I found it too difficult to get into and that just made it drag and feel like it went on forever. It’s a shame as I really wanted to like it!

This is the third Beartown book and no, I wouldn't recommend you jump right in. It's well worth taking the time to start at the beginning. (Go. Now. Go to Beartown and start at page 1.)

Of course this book is quite an investment of time in itself - it's a long finish to this lovely series about a community of two towns obsessed with hockey, and at times you will wonder why you're flitting from character perspective to character perspective, why you can't just zoom along to the end. But the truth is the story is always building to a climax and all of those characters have purpose. (Whether you can argue the same for the political sub-plots I'm not sure, though the interlinked nature of those for some reason reminded me of complex shenanigans in Catch 22, though I could be misremembering as I read that 25 years ago...).

Another truth is that you're either going to get on with Backman's writing style in this series, or he's going to start winding you up more than usual with The Winners. There is more foreboding in this single book than in, well, pretty much any other book I've ever read. Lots of (and these examples are made up), "If only they'd known that was the last time they'd laugh together," and "They sang all night and later they would look back on it fondly, knowing now what they could not know then".

Yep, something big is on its way and Backman will NOT let it drop, he will NOT let you forget about it. He wants you tasting that foreboding and dreading what's to come.

The absolute WORST thing about all of this is that you think "Well if he's going to manipulate me like this then I refuse to be manipulated. I simply won't be sad when all the foreboding comes to pass."

The worst thing is that you're wrong.

I got to the end of this book. This beautifully told book with the characters who are each realised so well. I got to the end and I sobbed like a baby. I had to explain to my kids why mummy was crying so much. And my eyes were wrecked the next day. Thanks a lot, Backman.

Who knew crying over a hockey town was a thing? But it's not just a hockey town, is it? It's people dealing with the same struggles we deal with all the world over, thrown into focus through hockey.

It's beautiful. But yes, it's also quite long and drawn out (and with much foreboding).

Another excellent novel from Backman. His writing style is one of my favourites and has me intrigued and encapsulated from the off. This is a brilliant addition to the Beartown series with more rivalries and heartache and broken characters trying to find their way.

It is breaking my heart to put 3 starts to Fredrik Backman as he is one of my fav writers. I loved Beartown (the first book), but I did not like the second one. I was excited to be approved for the third one because it is Backman. Unfortunately, I didn’t feel connected to the characters as much as I was in the other two books. It took really long to finish it. The book is just overlong.

There are even more characters than in previous books and sometimes it was really hard to track them all down. Though I liked we had a family from Hed, and had a chance to see their point of view.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with a free digital copy of this in exchange for an honest review.

Wow what an outstanding book this , This book will make you cry , many thanks to the publishers and netgalley for the arc of this book in exchange for this review

I have sat down to write this review several times, and each time I've been at a loss for words.

Let me preface this by saying I've been waiting a long time for this book. Backman is my favourite author, and his Beartown trilogy will forever be my favourite books. That being said, I was nervous going into "The Winners", afraid that I had set my expectations too high. Finalising the series of books I love so much would be a difficult task for any author, and I had almost impossible expectations for this book.

I was not disappointed.

I devoured this book in two days, and it's not a short book. I laughed, I cried (a lot. And I mean a lot. Invest in some good quality tissues before you read this - you'll thank me later), and I exclaimed out loud.

This book simultaneously broke my heart and healed my soul - and there is nothing more I could have asked from it.

I could go into great detail about the plot and the characters, the satisfying arcs and the perfect places we left each character, but I won't. I'll simply urge you to read this book. I can almost guarantee that it will change something in you. Backman's way of capturing the simple essence of what makes us human (and using beautiful metaphors while doing it) is absolutely unmatched. I finished this book as a different person to the one I was when I started it.

If you read three books in your lifetime, let them be "Beartown", "Us Against You" and "The Winners".

I will update the review with a link to our blog closer to publication date.
I'd like to thank the publisher Simon & Schuster UK and Netgalley for providing me with an advance reader copy in exchange for an honest review