He stands there, slowly twisting the wedding ring on his finger. As if looking for something else to say. He still finds it painfully difficult being the one to take charge of a conversation. That was always something she took care of. He usually just answered. This is a new situation for them both.  Finally Ove squats, digs up the plant he brought last week, and carefully puts it in a plastic bag. He turns the frozen soil carefully before putting in the new plants.

“They’ve bumped up the electricity prices again,” he informs her as he gets on his feet.

He looks at her for a long time. Finally he puts his hand carefully on the big boulder and caresses it tenderly from side to side as if touching her cheek.

“I miss you,” he whispers.

It’s been six months since she died.

 From “A man called Ove,” by Fredrik Backman.

What a refreshing novel! Fredrik Backman digs deep into the soul of the main character in his book.  It reminds me of Cervantes’ “Don Quixote.”   Both protagonists, cantankerous Ove and the idealistic knight of La Mancha, teach us great life lessons. And they do it chapter by chapter because most of them can be read as a complete short story, with a beginning and an end.  Maybe Backman did that. He subtracted Sancho Panza—the eternal companion of Don Quixote—from the greatest novel ever written and went on to narrate his own masterpiece.  I don’t know Swedish, but Backman’s prose in English is beautiful, simple, and effective. It triggers the imagination of the readers who witness the adventures of this modern knight—Ove.