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Will Ferguson: Happiness (2003, Perennial) 3 stars

Review of 'Happiness' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

A cynical, satirical novel about what would happen to the world if self help books actually worked. The book pulls no punches making fun of every aspect of the self-help and enlightenment industry, not to mention big publishing houses, marketing, and office work in general. It's an entertaining read but very bleak humour and the ending felt a little flat and anticlimactic. Although this book seems to have won the "Stephen Leacock award for humour", I would actually recommend the author's earlier book "I Was a Teenage Katima-Victim" as much funnier.