Friday, January 18, 2008

Geography of Bliss


The Geography of Bliss wasn't quite what I expected. I picked it up because one of the blurbs on the back compared it favorably to Bill Bryson's writing, and I was in a mood to laugh. Didn't make me laugh more than a few chuckles, but it did make me think.

Eric Weiner travels around the world, exploring the concept of "happy places," places where the inhabitants are considered "happy." He hits some places that are supposed to be among the happiest, like Denmark and Bhutan, and some on the other end, like Moldova. He talks to happiness "experts" and looks at concepts like Bhutan's policy of Gross National Happiness. And he does some soul searching to find what kind of place makes him happy. Overall, this was thought provoking and really readable. I'd recommend it to a friend who reads nonfiction, if I had any...

Book 2

4 comments:

SnowLeopard said...

Soooo, any secrets to finding happiness you'd like to share with us non-nonfiction readers?

MarcT. said...

Hey! I read NF! Sometimes. When I read anything at all. Popular Mechanics and Wired are NF, aren't they?

Turi Becker said...

No, no secrets, sorry. And I was really just trying to scare some NF readers out of the woodwork...

Gail said...

I read this review just before heading for my library. Sure enough, all fiction. So I checked the new books section and found a couple NF to browse and maybe read! Browsing "Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge, the Book of Mnemonic Devices", I discovered the first 5 James Bond films are in alphabetical order: DFGTY. Ok, now your day's complete!