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Hector and the Search for Happiness (Movie Tie-In): A Novel
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Hector and the Search for Happiness (Movie Tie-In): A Novel
Unavailable
Hector and the Search for Happiness (Movie Tie-In): A Novel
Ebook176 pages2 hours

Hector and the Search for Happiness (Movie Tie-In): A Novel

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

3.5/5

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About this ebook

Now a major motion picture starring Simon Pegg, Rosamund Pike, Toni Collette, and Christopher Plummer
 
The international bestseller with more than two million copies sold
 

“Once upon a time there was a young psychiatrist called Hector who was not very satisfied with himself. . . . And so he decided to take a trip around the world, and everywhere he went he would try to understand what made people happy or unhappy.”

Hector travels from Paris to China to Africa to the United States, and along the way he keeps a list of observations about the people he meets. Combining the winsome appeal of The Little Prince with the inspiring philosophy of The Alchemist, Hector’s journey around the world and into the human soul is entertaining, empowering, and smile-inducing—as winning in its optimism as it is wise in its simplicity.
LanguageEnglish
PublisherPenguin Group
Release dateAug 31, 2010
ISBN9781101458983
Unavailable
Hector and the Search for Happiness (Movie Tie-In): A Novel

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Reviews for Hector and the Search for Happiness (Movie Tie-In)

Rating: 3.25 out of 5 stars
3.5/5

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  • Rating: 1 out of 5 stars
    1/5
    Meh.
    A rare occasion where I recommend the movie over the book.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    An easy read, heartwarming and not too taxing.
    Hector the psychiatrist in search of the meaning of happiness.
    A great read. One for the long winter nights with a cup of hot chocolate!
    I was given a digital copy of this novel by the publisher via Netgalley in return for an honest unbiased review.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Can't decide between 2 and 3 stars. I went back and forth between being charmed by the simplicity of the writing and being annoyed by the same thing. A little less fiction and more self help than I had hoped for.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    Read this on the plane to and from Germany on a rare weekend away from the Bedfordshire portacabin. I kept waiting for it to be transcendent... and it never was. I get that we are suppose to learn the simple lessons of happiness that Hector encounters, but it felt childishly written - and not in a good way like The Girl Who Saved The King Of Sweden. Next.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Hector, a psychiatrist leaves his long term girlfriend to find out if people are happier in other parts of the world or are they just as unhappy everywhere. The book doesn't identify where he is from or where he is visiting. It was enjoyable to figure it out based of context clues. In any event Hector ends up cheating on his girlfriend twice which sort of ruined it for me. As a shrink you think he'd know that that kind of behavior will lead to certain unhappiness.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Cute, tiny book about a psychiatrist who searches the world to figure out what makes people happy. Has it's profound moments. Just a slightly charming tale.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is a very simple, almost youth division book, except for some of his subjects. It's a super fast read and interesting. Most of Hector's conclusions are well known but it is nice to see them all in one spot.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    French psychiatrist embarks on an international trip to decide what makes people happy. Written like a modern parable, in very simple language--reminded me a bit of the Little Prince. And I supposed you could call it cheap philosophy. Still, we probably spend too little time thinking about what really makes us happy and the book will get you doing that--which isnt a bad use of a few hours.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    "a charming parable", "winning in its optimism"i agree with these reviews. very good narrator
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    When dealing with a topic like happiness and a quest to discover how to "achieve" it or to compile a list of lessons that might help others be happy, a sense of whimsy is more than a little appreciated. Thank goodness that Hector and the Search for Happiness has this in spades. Told with a narrative tone befitting a fable for adults, Francois Lelord's novel was originally written in French and is a European best-seller. Now we Americans (who pride ourselves on the whole pursuit of happiness thing, at least in theory) have the ability to learn from Hector and his many lessons as he travels the world to learn what makes us happy.This is how Gallic Books summarizes this novel:Hector is a successful young psychiatrist. He’s very good at treating patients in real need of his help. But many people he sees have no health problems: they’re just deeply dissatisfied with their lives. Hector can’t do much for them, and it’s beginning to depress him.So when a patient tells him he looks in need of a holiday, Hector decides to set off round the world to find out what makes people everywhere happy (and sad), and whether there is such a thing as the secret of true happiness… Narrated with deceptive simplicity, its perceptive observations on happiness offer us the chance to reflect on the contentment we all look for in our own lives.This is a pretty accurate description of the basic plot, even if it neglects to mention just how amusing things are. I could almost hear Stephen Fry narrating the general story as we went along, that's the kind of tone it struck. Despite Hector's obvious intelligence, he was a little naive as he went along, taking an approach as a child might to studying adults and figuring out what made them tick. I particularly enjoyed an early moment in the book where Hector asks his girlfriend whether she's happy and she starts to cry and asks if he's leaving her. Desperately backpedaling (without any clue as to what he's said wrong), he insists he's simply trying to determine what makes people happy and so he starts keeping a list of truths, most of which actually do apply to just about everyone. The particular amusement that comes with Hector, a successful and intelligent therapist, is the fact that simple facts of life become great truths, and everyone could do well to remember little things when faced with over-complicated situations. He travels from "his own country" to various places, including the country of More (gee, one guess as to what country *this* might be) and notes that people in More aren't any happier because they have more... in fact, they tend to be even less happy than people in other countries where they have less, but might reprioritize their values. It's not that Lelord ever tries to beat us over the head with anything (I imagine that depending upon what each individual reader values, one would notice ample evidence supporting certain things or a lack of focus on others), but instead he seems to phrase these truths about happiness in as abstract a way as possible without being totally inaccessible. Lelord's small novel will indubitably charm any reader with a sense of humor, as will Hector himself. Genuine and full of a honest openness, Hector and the Search for Happiness will not have you reassessing the things that make you happy, but will probably make you appreciative of the fact that you didn't have to travel all around the world and survive Hector's ordeals to learn his lessons... indeed, you probably know them already, though you may not have distilled them into such simple truths. I might avoid giving this one as a gift to anyone who is trying to figure out just what makes them happy (as Hector comes off as a bit dim and clueless at times, and one would hate to inadvertently imply something to the person on the receiving end, though Hector is always lovable if not always conventionally "moral"), but most literate people will find Hector a charming fellow and well worth the quick read.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Hector and the Search for Happiness By Francois Lelord Hector is a psychiatrist who cannot understand why some of his patients (actually most) have no apparent health, family or job problems but are not happy. Although he tries and tries he is not able to sufficiently help them. Hector, who had always thought of himself as "happy" begins to feel sad that he cannot help all his patients and decides to travel the world on a holiday in search for the secret to happiness. This fable/story is a laugh out loud tale that rings true on many different levels. With each chapter are life lessons that the reader may say they already know, but it is always best to be reminded of the simple truth. Lesson no. 24 Happiness is reading a good book.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    This book is sneaky. It seems like a simple story, told in a tone that is reminiscent of fairy tales made to be read to children (though it is translated from French, which may be adding to the formality of it). However, some powerful insights are packed into this little paperback. Hector, a psychiatrist, goes on a globe trotting quest to find out what happiness is made of. He ends up with a list of 22 (it would have been 23, but he scratched #18 out) things that help to create happiness. I found it entirely charming and very thought provoking, a gentle read for just about anyone.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    (Reprinted from the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com]. I am the original author of this essay, as well as the owner of CCLaP; it is not being reprinted illegally.)This slight little French tale, originally published in 2002 but just now coming out in the US, has apparently become one of those quirky global hits that has now sold over two million copies, and has spawned a whole series of sequels; essentially an autobiographical tale about the psychiatrist author's mid-life crisis, it follows him as he travels around the world on a sabbatical seeking the true keys to happiness, realizing that it essentially boils down to a series of cutesy new-age homilies that sound vaguely like a cross between Buddhism and Joel Osteen, as well as plenty of volunteer work for us privileged white folk in the decrepit failed states of the world that Lelord traveled to on a regular basis during his own vision quest. But I gotta say, I myself could barely choke my way through even half of this before exasperatingly giving up; not because of its message, which is harmless if not fairly predictable, but rather because Lelord wrote the entire thing as a simplistic children's fairytale, which will no doubt delight your suburban mom when you buy her a copy for Christmas, but will drive most grown-ups quite crazy quite fast. It's one of those infuriatingly upbeat "it takes a village" titles destined for the point-of-purchase shelf full of shiny cute doodads right next to the cash register, and it unfortunately reads exactly so.Out of 10: 6.0
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is one of those marmite books - you either enjoy it - finding it charming, or else hate it finding it too cute and patronising - I'm one of the former.It’s a simple premise. Hector is a young psychiatrist; he loves his job and is good at it, but he’s finding that sorting out depressed people every day was beginning to drag him down too. Also his longterm relationship with Clara is stagnating. So he decides to take time off and travel around the world visiting his friends and colleagues to see if he can find out the secrets of happiness. He flies off around the world where he meets and falls for a Chinese callgirl, encounters a very wise old Chinese monk, negotiates with drug barons and gets kidnapped in Africa, and visits a professor of happiness while staying with friends in the land of ‘More’ before returning to work via another visit to the Chinese monk to tell him what he’d found out. All ends are tied then up neatly.Hector’s author is himself a psychiatrist, and in the short Q&A at the back, he tells how he wanted to write a sort-of self-help book as a novel, but it is this epithet of ‘self-help’ that seems to have put peoples’ backs up. If you ignore this aspect and read it as a novel, it is great fun, full of great observations about life, and it definitely has a droll sense of humour. The naive fablelistic (is that a word?) style may not be to everyone’s liking but suited me fine, although the neat ending was a bit of a copout.This the fourth title I’ve read from Gallic Books and I’ve enjoyed all of them, finding a strong liking for contemporary French literature. (8/10) I bought this book.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    This slight book is about a psychiatrist named Hector who travels the world trying to understand what makes people happy (and conversely what makes them unhappy). He is not entirely satisfied with life himself and so he is looking for the keys to contentment. Hector finds small bits of wisdom throughout his travels and he jots these tiny kernels of truth down in a notebook, ultimately compiling a list of universal happiness factors. Despite a barebones frame of a plot, this is really very much a self-help book masquerading as fiction. And indeed, it turns out that the author has written successful self-help books. I am certainly not the best audience for self-help, even self-help cloaked in fictional raiment as I find too many of the revelations to be self-evident. In this case, the lessons are also simplistic and trite. The fact that these truths are coming from a character who apparently finds happiness in (literally) a woman in many of the places he goes despite his partner at home also helped make this a slightly unpleasant read. Obviously I didn't love this parable and don't see the marketing comparison to Le Petit Prince but perhaps readers who need reminding not to compare themselves to others and that "happiness is a certain way of seeing things" will find more of interest here than I did.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    My perspective: The sentences are short and deceptively simple. At first it seems like a children's book, but it is not. The book includes prostitutes, monks, and other adult topics.I smiled at some paragraphs; for example: "Hector is a psychiatrist; he only has to look at people to know where they went to school and whether their grandfather collected butterflies." I know a school psychologist who, five minutes after he meets someone, classifies that person according to Myers-Briggs, such as INFP or ESFJ.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This book will make you happier than before. I'm not sure why, but his voyage to find happiness will draw you in and if you tag along, you'll get something out of it that you didn't know you were looking for.