A Man Called Ove

by Fredrik Backman

‘You don’t fool me, darling,’ she said with a playful little smile and crept into his big arms. ‘You’re dancing on the inside, Ove, when no one’s watching. And I’ll always love you for that. Whether you like it or not.’ Ove never quite fathomed what she meant by that. He’d never been one for dancing. It seemed far too haphazard and giddy. He liked straight lines and clear decisions. That was why he had always liked mathematics. There were right or wrong answers there. Not like the other hippy subjects they tried to trick you into doing at school, where you could ‘argue your case’. As if that was a way of concluding a discussion: checking who knew more long words. Ove wanted what was right to be right, and what was wrong to be wrong.