Anxious People by Fredrik Backman
1) “The younger man’s favorite food, if you were to ask the older officer, is ‘that made-up stuff, algae and seaweed and raw fish, he thinks he’s some sort of damn hermit crab.'”
2) “‘Do you know what the worst thing about being a parent is? That you’re always judged by your worst moments. You can do a million things right, but if you do one single thing wrong you’re forever that parent who was checking his phone in the park when your child was hit in the head by a swing.'” – man on the bridge
3) “‘”Correct.” Is that how you talk? You sound like you’re doing role-play with someone who gets turned on by accountants.’” – London
4) “It was called a crisis in the financial markets, a bank crash, even though the only ones who crash are people.”
5) “Addicts are good at lying, but never as good as their children. It’s their sons and daughters who have to come up with excuses, never too outlandish or incredible, always mundane enough for no one to want to check them.”
6) “‘You need psychology if you think you’re a dolphin. You need psychiatry if you’ve killed all the dolphins.'” – Zara
7) “In a long marriage, you don’t need words to have a row, but you don’t need words to say ‘I love you’ either.”
8) “She hadn’t looked this scared since the last time she tried to photograph her shoes and accidentally clicked the selfie button instead.”
9) “‘Have you ever held a three-year-old by the hand on the way home from preschool?'” – Anna-Lena
10) “‘We can’t change the world, and a lot of the time we can’t even change people. No more than one bit at a time. So we do what we can to help whenever we get the chance, sweetheart. We save those we can. We do our best.'” – Jack’s mom
This book is full of so many great one liners that I could only include a small percent of them here. The story itself took a backseat to the characters, who all pop off the page and are funny in their own ways. One thing I hadn’t expected was the emphasis on parenthood. This might be one of the few books that I want to reread in the future.