July 5, 2010
This trite debut follows a psychiatrist named Hector as he attempts to understand "what made people happy." At a crossroads professionally and personally, Hector resolves to take a trip, first landing in China, where he reconnects with an old friend and encounters Ying Li, with whom he spends a night. He also meets an old monk who offers a bit of happiness-related wisdom. Having suffered disappointment in his relations with Ying Li, Hector next heads to Africa, where he makes the acquaintance of a drug lord with a depressed wife, is kidnapped, and learns that "it's harder to be happy in a country run by bad people." Next up is the "big country where there were more psychiatrists than anywhere else in the world" and a meeting with a professor of "Happiness Studies." Lelord, a psychiatrist, writes in the simple prose you'd find in a children's book, and this stylistic choice quickly becomes irredeemably grating. Though the book is an international bestseller, it is far less a novel than a maudlin self-help guide that substitutes pat aphorisms for development.
Starred review from December 1, 2010
Lelord's internationally best-selling debut novel was first published in France in 2002. It is a parable centering on Hector, a young Parisian psychiatrist who, disheartened by his patients' misery, sets out in search of the secret to happiness, traveling to China, Africa, and, eventually, the United States, i.e., "the country that has more psychiatrists than any other." He returns to Paris wiser and, indeed, happier. The fable is presented in a deliberately simple style recalling Antoine de Saint-Exupery's The Little Prince. Narrator James Clamp's precise British diction is perfect for the occasionally pedantic text, whose detailed scenes are revealed with often delicious irony and humor. Highly recommended. [A film adaptation of the Penguin pb, which was described as being "charming, clever, humorous, and insightful" (LJ 9/15/10), is currently in development; Lelord's next Hector book has already been signed by Viking.--Ed.]--Nann Blaine Hilyard, Zion-Benton P.L., IL
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