Is it boring? ‘The Answer is no’: an outstanding funny short story

Book Title: The Answer is no: a short story

Author: Fredrik Backman

(Translated from Swedish by Elizabeth DeNoma)

My Rating ^{(* have a look at my rating scale here)}: 5/5

I discovered this gem on Kindle Unlimited! A witty satire on modern day living and happenings. In just 67 pages, it makes one laugh out loud and at time gives points to ponder. With just a handful of characters and only two with proper names, ‘Lucas’ and ‘Linda’, the story is hilarious, relatable and modern. There are two women named on the color of dress that they wear- ‘purple dress’ and ‘green shirt’.

The plot: simple, modern and relatable

Lucas is happy because “All he did was to remove the one thing that makes almost all people unhappy: other people”, he is happy as “its everything he has minus humans”. He lives in an apartment alone, eats pad thai, drinks wine, and play video games. One fine day all hell breaks loose when someone puts an old frying pan on the ground outside the recycle room, supposedly violating the building rules! The rule- loving ‘board’, described as a ‘bureaucratic hydra’, is hell bent on finding the culprit so that they can be appropriately punished. One thing leads to another and one frying pan becomes a pile of junk. How Lucas gets involved and comes out of all this mess is what this short funny story is all about.

My take…

I have not read this kind of writing since a long time. I remember reading a short story called “A table is a table”, in which a man who lived alone, changes the names of the things in his house, he renames everything and memorizes the new names so much so that after a while he could not talk to anyone. So, although the story starts as a funny one, ends with sadness and deep thoughts about loneliness.

‘The answer is no’ is somewhat similar, it starts as a funny one but ends with some profound thoughts. At the end what Lucas wants is time alone and finish his video game. In the present modern world do we just crave for this alone, me time? As a society are we just superficial, as on facebook and social media? Is there some hope that we can save each other just as purple dress, green shirt and Lucas did?

A must read. One can read it in one go, but it is definitely worth revisiting for some deep thinking…

“Quote Unquote”

“people aren’t supposed to be happy, they’re only supposed to want to be happy, because how otherwise are you supposed to be able to sell things to them?”

“A funny thing about rule-loving people is that to them it seems more important to impose punishment than it is to actually solve problems, and a funny thing, about rule-breaking people is that they seem to find breaking rules a lot easier to do if someone else has broken them first.”

“’Responsibility’ and ‘commitment’ are actually two of the easiest ways of ruining any perfectly good day.”

“Truth about problems is that the problem itself is never actually the problem. It’s always the people involved who are the problem.”

“I’m …no expert. But I think most people who want to be happy try to add things to their lives. But really what maybe they should be doing is taking something away.”

“He has found that the easiest way to be happy is to think about time in about eight-hour increments, and to always have something to look forward to at the end of those hours.”

“If you want to see normal people turn into power-hungry dictators in five minutes, all you have to do is say the magic words: ‘We’d love to hear your suggestions!”

“The doctors and nurses understand very well that all the modern pills and treatments are surely great, but sometimes what people really need most of all us a prescription for a break.”