{"product_id":"9781039058965","title":"I Want You to Be Happy","description":"\u003cb\u003eNAMED 'A BEST DEBUT NOVELIST' BY \u003ci\u003eTHE OBSERVER • \u003c\/i\u003eNAMED A MOST ANTICIPATED NOVEL BY \u003ci\u003eGOOD HOUSEKEEPING \u003c\/i\u003e• \u003ci\u003eTHE TIMES\u003c\/i\u003e • \u003ci\u003eGQ \u003c\/i\u003e• \u003ci\u003eTHE GUARDIAN\u003c\/i\u003e • \u003ci\u003eTHE SUNDAY TIMES STYLE \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“\u003ci\u003eI Want You to Be Happy\u003c\/i\u003e is an irresistible novel that asks complex questions about contemporary life and refuses easy answers. I couldn’t stop reading.” —Sally Rooney\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Jem Calder’s \u003ci\u003eI Want You To Be Happy\u003c\/i\u003e brought me so close to its characters that their world became more real to me than my own. This is a gripping, wise, sad, funny book. It pays such close attention to the textures of life as it's actually lived—in all its in-between moments and unspoken feelings and ambivalence, its blackouts and needy texts and ambushes of tenderness. Jem Calder feels like a particular kind of wizard, sculpting precisely-realized moments of aliveness that feel, at once, startlingly lucid and radiant with mystery. I was utterly enthralled.” —Leslie Jamison\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eChuck 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.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFunny, excruciating, and true, \u003ci\u003eI Want You to Be Happy \u003c\/i\u003eis a sharp-eyed tale of two people searching for meaning and connection in modern times, missing the mark maybe, but trying.","brand":"Jem Calder","offers":[{"title":"Knopf Canada |  Hardback  |  2026-07-14","offer_id":48468406337791,"sku":"9781039058965","price":35.0,"currency_code":"CAD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0329\/9075\/7001\/files\/BNCImageAPI_75d58f53-2fb7-436b-b294-a95b2a79d8ed.jpg?v=1777563866","url":"https:\/\/riverbookshop.com\/products\/9781039058965","provider":"River Bookshop","version":"1.0","type":"link"}