UPPSALA – The Daily Roxette received a copy of Maria Sörgjerd’s book “I en underbar ballong – en bok om att älska Roxette” (In a Wonderful Balloon – a Book about Loving Roxette” published by her own company Fenomena förlag. The book is about Roxette’s fans and why they love Roxette. It has been written from a psychological point of view since author Sörgjerd majored in psychology. Maria has also interviewed lots of mainly non-Swedish fans.

So what conclusions does she reach? Well, it’s hard to say. Some things are self evident, being a Roxette fan myself. Some things I don’t recognize at all. All in all she puts her finger on the small phenomenons that happen when crazy Roxette fans are involved, good things mostly, but also bad things. What I find interesting is that she has also noticed this viscious hostility among Roxette fans. The book tries to describe to outsiders how it is to be a Roxette fan. I’m not sure Maria manages that, if feels like the only ones who would understand this already know. And the ones who don’t, won’t care, sadly. Roxette is usually never viewed in a positive way in Sweden, not by media at least. What I miss in the book is going deeper in the cases Maria has interviewed. Interesting as they may be, I want to know more about the specific people. What happened in their lives to make them turn to Roxette like a religion? How do you leave your husband/wife/so behind to travel literally thousands of miles to listen to a band that sings in a foreign tongue?

“I en underbar ballong” will initially only be published in Swedish, which is good! Then foreign fans will get another incentive to learn the gods’ native language!