I Want You to Be Happy — Jem Calder

A tender, witty, and sharp debut novel about the passions and peculiarities of modern love, by ???an extraordinarily gifted writer??? (Sally Rooney).Chuck and Joey meet in a bar. He???s in his mid-thirties; she???s twelve years younger. He long ago abandoned his ambition of being a novelist and works as a copywriter at a big ad agency. Lead copywriter, he corrects himself. Joey is living 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 is imagining a future between them and Chuck is moving on from a mistake in his recent past. Amazing, how meeting a new person can make you feel so new.Funny, excruciating, and true, Jem Calder's 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 still trying.