I Want You to Be Happy by Jem Calder

Chuck 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 mistake in his recent past. Amazing, how meeting a new person can make you feel so new. Funny, excruciating, and true, 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.