There was a funny moment last year when, in the introduction for March’s Book of the Month Conversations With Friends, I rallied against judging a book by its cover. Determined to get over my own prejudices, I’d chosen Sally Rooney’s debut novel while staunchly ignoring all the signs on the book cover and blurb that told me I wouldn’t like the book. After all, it was a hit! Critics and John Q. Public alike raved about Rooney’s work! So I read Conversations with an open mind.

I ended up hating it.

Okay, “hate” is a strong word. I could appreciate there was craft and consideration in those pages, but I couldn’t bring myself to like the damn thing. All the initial warning signs I’d told myself to look past came back to haunt me, showing me that my initial judgment had been right. If anything, Conversations reinforced my book cover prejudice by proving to be exactly what I’d thought it’d be.

Fast forward to this year. As I compiled my book club recommendations from readers, I began gathering information on Fredrik Backman’s Anxious People. When I saw the cover, the same sinking feeling I’d felt with Conversations returned. While not the same artist, the cover for Anxious People practically begs to be compared to Conversations: yellow, visual weight split in half by two figures, a quirky blurb that talked more about interpersonal drama than a plot. To say I wasn’t overly enthused about starting the book is an understatement. Still, a reader had recommended it to me. I cleared my head. Opened my mind. Tried to ignore the cover, as I had with Rooney’s work. Read the first page.

And the next. And the next.

Within fifteen minutes of reading Anxious People, I had already laughed out loud once, startling my dog from her nap. After half an hour, my general bemusement turned to intrigue. I read nearly a quarter of the book in that first sit-down, completely hooked and lamenting that I had to stop to eat dinner. Fredrik Backman had done what I’d hoped Sally Rooney’s debut novel would do- create a story that transcended the made-to-market cover.

After finishing the book, I also forgave the quirky, tell-nothing blurb. While I still think there are ways it could’ve been improved, I now know from doing several rewrites myself how hard it is to summarize Anxious People. It’s a locked room mystery with a bank robbery gone wrong, a police investigation, a hostage situation with the worst hostages in the world, and a bridge, but it’s also not about any of those things at all. At its core, Backman’s Anxious People is about how hard it is to be human and the need to see that struggle in others. But, it’s also about idiots. Lots and lots of idiots.

So many idiots, in fact, that I was concerned when I realized just how large the cast of characters was. I’d been impressed with N. K. Jemisin’s handling of a large cast in January, but Anxious People more than doubled the number of characters with speaking parts, causing me some concern over how I would keep them all in line in my head, or how any of them would develop enough to have a satisfying resolution. To my surprise, even with limited page length, Backman manages to create memorable, fully-realized characters for most of the cast. Even with upwards of twelve “critical” characters, each was made human with a mixture of goofiness and true, relatable anxieties, and all were kept together by Backman’s most valuable asset: his voice.

Flipping from flippant to sincere in a span of sentences, Backman manages to balance vulnerability with the absurd, crafting situations, events, and dialogue that make you laugh out loud while still maintaining a strong emotional core. The scales never tip too far to one side; difficult topics such as suicide, grief, and infidelity are handled with the utmost care before being counterbalanced by lighthearted silliness. It’s an amazing feat of translation that Backman’s voice made it from Swedish to English without losing its equilibrium and characterization as, throughout much of the book, the voice is essential. It becomes a character itself.

With all the unique and slightly ridiculous cast members, it’s important that the voice of the novel, the unnamed narrator, be among them. We often forget about the narrator while reading about the character ensemble, but the narrator does interject regularly, speaking directly to the reader to provide background information, context, or commentary throughout the book. These fourth-wall breaks and subtle phrasing choices drop clues or hide information, with off-hand remarks and general levity obscuring key information that drives the locked-room mystery plot forward. It allows for fulfilling “Aha!” moments for the reader, while still maintaining the carefully-crafted tone the book needs to drive home its central theme.

And that theme? With all the idiots ordering Capricciosa pizzas, drinking in the closet, and a rabbit in a bathroom? Compassion. Much like Somebody’s Daughter, Anxious People is, in essence, a call for us to remember that everyone around us is experiencing the same thing: life. Life is good, life is hard, and life is weird, and all of us are stumbling through it and trying the best we can. Compassion for others, and building bridges to connect with them, can go a long way to making the journey a little less scary and overwhelming.

Now, this is normally where I’d invite those who’d finished the book down to the spoiler section to discuss themes and plot elements in detail. For Anxious People, I’ve decided to skip this section. The theme, as discussed above, is pointed and available to analyze throughout the book. The only spoilers I could potentially discuss are plot-related and, for a locked-room mystery, that feels like missing the point. I’d also ask that those who have read the book be very careful about any comments you may drop on this post. We don’t want to spoil the journey for others!

If you, like me, were initially turned off by the cover for Anxious People, I highly recommend pushing past it. Inside is a fun, sincere book that will have something in it for most people to resonate with. As for me, I’ve already started a re-read, finding the clever clues Backman hid in the pages and admiring the craft from a different angle. Yes, I’m re-reading while I still have other books on my plate. It was that good.

I hope you’ll join me next month, for the second half of my fanfiction series and Diana Khoi Nguyen’s poetry collection, Ghost Of, for National Poetry Month. Until then, happy reading and happy sipping!