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I Want You To Be Happy

I Want You To Be Happy

Author(s): Jem Calder

Location(s): London

Genre(s): Fiction

Era(s): Contemporary

Chuck and Joey meet in a bar. He’s in his mid-thirties; she’s twelve years younger. He’s long abandoned his ambition of becoming a novelist and now works as a copywriter at a big ad agency. ‘Lead copywriter,’ he corrects himself. Joey lives paycheck to paycheck on her barista wages and privately dreams of making it as a poet. They go back to Chuck’s luxury flat-a world away from Joey’s cramped house-share, the crumbs in her bed. Soon, Joey’s imagining a future between them, and Chuck’s moving on from a major change in his recent past. Amazing, how meeting a new person can make you feel so new.

Funny, excruciating, and true, I Want You to Be Happy is a sharp-eyed tale of two people searching for meaning and connection in modern times, missing the mark maybe, but trying.

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