Canadian Fiction, Women's Fiction, Family & Friendship - Fiction

Sad Truth about Happiness

Name: Sad Truth about Happiness
Author: Anne Giardini
ISBN: 9780060741778

by Anne Giardini

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Overview

"Maggie is in her early thirties, gainfully employed, between relationships, and ready for change - although not in the ways or to the degree that unfolds in Anne Giardini's The Sad Truth About Happiness." "Maggie's roommate, Rebecca, devises questionnaires for women's magazines, and she is convinced her newest quiz can predict the exact date of death of anyone who answers the questions honestly. When Maggie tries the test, she learns that she is scheduled to die before her next birthday - the fact that she answered "No" to the question "Are you happy?" appears to have shaved decades off her life. Only if Maggie can become happy in her three remaining months can she perhaps prevent the prediction from coming true." With wry comedy, Maggie's life becomes considerably more complicated from that very moment, since her quest for happiness attracts both admirers and challenges. The true test comes when, through a mad tangle of circumstance, Maggie finds herself on the run with her sister Lucy's newborn son. The often unexpected power of friendships and family, the universal pull toward a home, and a more intense relationship with the world all leave Maggie and the reader with a new awareness of the evanescent joys of happiness, which we all long for, but can seldom seek directly or hold for longer than an instant.

Synopsis

A beautiful and affecting novel — bittersweet and comic — on the elusive nature of happiness

Maggie is in her early thirties, gainfully employed, between relationships, and ready for a change. But when she takes a quiz in a magazine that promises to predict the date of a person's death, she's shocked to learn she's going to die before her next birthday unless she can somehow discover contentment in life. What ensues is a quirky and satisfying journey in pursuit of true happiness, a quest that leads to unexpected joys and perceptions.

Publishers Weekly

This charming though overwritten debut from novelist Carol Shields's eldest daughter hinges on the sympathetic protagonist's realization that she is "not completely" happy, an insight that surprises her when a magazine quiz devised to predict longevity calculates that she has but three months to live. Thirty-something Maggie Selgrin, an unmarried radiation technologist in a Vancouver hospital, has always been the even-tempered middle daughter in a remarkably wholesome family. Despite her professional stability, solid friendships and close family, the quiz triggers her admission of discontent. Not only does she ache for romance (she links joy with the idea of a relationship), but she realizes she has always subsumed her needs to those of her more temperamental sisters. Maggie flounders and fumbles to regain her emotional footing before no less than three men enliven her static existence and she becomes embroiled in the kidnapping of her sister Lucy's baby. Giardini's meditative, hyper-descriptive prose can bog down the plot, but readers will surely relate to her likable heroine. And if the story offers no novel lessons about life, love or the pursuit of happiness ("Happiness evades capture, dissolving like a melody into the air, eluding even the most delicate, careful grasp"), it does provide a pleasantly entertaining journey. (May) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

About the Author, Anne Giardini

Anne Giardini is a lawyer and mother of three. She has written and published essays, stories, and articles on many topics and was a columnist for the National Post, one of Canada's national newspapers. She lives in Vancouver, Canada.

Reviews

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Editorials

Fay Weldon

"A fully formed new voice, poignant, funny and acute."

Washington Post Book World

"Giardini’s peripatetic style reveals an attractive curiosity about the infinite variety in people’s lives, both happy and sad."

New York Newsday

"Giardini appreciates the difference between happy enough and deeper satisfaction, and parses these nuances with an appealingly light touch."

BookPage

"First-time novelist Anne Giardini delivers a powerful story [and] a character for the ages."

Boston Globe

"A confident voice and a luminous lyrical prose style."

Atlanta Journal-Constitution

"Giardini deserves applause for her debut effort. She clearly demonstrates a talent for distilling moments that touch the human heart."

Publishers Weekly

Library Journal

Maggie Selgrin has always been known in her family as "the contented one"-ever practical and steady, in contrast to her mercurial sisters. She is in her early thirties, works as a mammogram technician (why did she ever consider that graduate degree in literature?), and lives in a Vancouver apartment with Rebecca, a magazine quiz and questionnaire designer. The latest quiz-"When Will You Die?"-startles Maggie by indicating that she has only a few months to live. Surely it's a mistake. A bout of insomnia, spiritual crisis, and the simultaneous appearance of three suitors send Maggie's life into turmoil that gets even worse when she kidnaps her newborn nephew, ostensibly to save him from a brewing international custody battle. With her acute sense of sickness, pain, and death, Maggie has a lot to learn about happiness. This first novel may remind us of works by the author's mother, Carol Shields, in its sensitive handling of rich characters and domestic detail. A touching and satisfying read; recommended for all public libraries.-Jenn B. Stidham, Houston Community Coll.-Northeast, TX Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

A debut by the eldest daughter of the late Carol Shields explores the ambitious theme of its title through the prism of a not terribly interesting single woman in Vancouver. When 32-year-old Maggie tests out one of the self-help quizzes her roommate Rebecca designs for a living, the quiz concludes that, based on her ambivalent response to the question "Are you happy," Maggie will die in three weeks. Easy-going Maggie loves her job giving mammograms, enjoys her apartment, goes hiking every weekend, has friends and seems pretty content, but the test results unsettle her. She stops sleeping, starts visiting a Catholic church and gradually morphs into someone who receives flattery and favors from everyone she meets. Soon, three men are vying for her attention: sexy fellow hiker Angus, courtly lawyer Charles and gentle do-gooder Leo. Meanwhile, Maggie's neurotic younger sister Lucy has left her married lover in Italy and come home, pregnant, to become engaged to Ryan. Lucy's and Maggie's romantic entanglements generate minimal heat (can Canadian men be as bland as Giardino implies?). After Lucy delivers a baby boy, Maggie accidentally gives the details to Lucy's Italian lover, who shows up with his wife to demand custody of his heir. Maggie steals the baby from the hospital and ends up hiding out in a French Canadian village near Montreal with a family of strong motherly women. While she and Rebecca are away, her apartment burns down-she'd have died if she'd been home (the prophecy fulfilled?). Maggie returns with the baby, whom Lucy gets to keep after a custody battle, pleads guilty of having taken the infant and gets a short term of house arrest but doesn't lose her job. Charles diessuddenly of a heart attack, Leo heads to Kosovo and Maggie sees more of Angus. For all the plot events, the story feels scattershot. A more serious problem is that, for all the musing about happiness and loss, the characters' emotions never rise above the tepid. Neither will readers'.