The Pursuit of Happiness

Format:	Paperback 656 pages

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Synopsis

New York, 1945 - Sara Smythe, a young, beautiful and intelligent woman, ready to make her own way in the big city attends her brothers Thanksgiving Eve party. As the party gets into full swing, in walks Jack Malone, a US Army journalist back from a defeated Germany and a man unlike any Sara has ever met before - one who is destined to change Sara's future forever. But finding love isn't the same as finding happiness - as Sara and Jack soon find out. In post-war America chance meetings aren't always as they seem, and people's choices can often have profound repercussions. Sara and Jack find they are subject to forces beyond their control and that their destinies are formed by more than just circumstance. In this world of intrigue and emotional conflict, Sara must fight to survive -against Jack, as much as for him. In this mesmerising tale of longing and betrayal, The Pursuit of Happiness is a great tragic love story; a tale of divided loyalties, decisive moral choices, and the random workings of destiny.

Book details

Published
07/06/2002

Publisher
Arrow Books Ltd

ISBN
9780099415374

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Jacket review

Manhattan 1945 and US Army journalist Jack Malone gatecrashes a Thanksgiving Eve party. Set amidst the dynamic post-war optimism and subsequent nightmare of the McCarthy witch-hunts, this acclaimed story of love and betrayal is a tale of divided loyalties, decisive moral choices and the random workings of destiny. Highly recommended.

UK Kirkus review

Douglas Kennedy's fourth novel is set in New York, and is written from the viewpoints of two women. The first is Kate, divorced and discontented. The novel opens at her mother's funeral, where she notices a striking, watchful stranger in her 70s. This woman, Sara Smythe, soon contacts Kate and without any explanation asks, insists even, that they should meet. Sara tells Kate that her father Jack, who died when Kate was a baby, was the love of her life. Then, only 60 pages into the novel, a bold switch of reader involvement is required, as Sara's written account of her life and her hidden love story fill the bulk of the novel. Sara also had a brother Eric, with whom she had a wonderful bantering relationship but also one of deepest affection and loyalty. She meets Jack Malone on wartime leave and her love for him is immediate, though he has to return for duty abroad the very next day. Despite his earnest promises, she does not hear from him for four years. Only much later does she learn that a casual relationship of his in Britain during the war led to pregnancy and a reluctant marriage. Their chequered love relationship continues amid the deepening horror of the McCarthy witch-hunts, about which Kennedy writes with passion and very well. Eric, who had been a member of the Communist Party in his youth, is drawn into the nightmare of being pressured to 'name names'. If he does not, he will not only be sacked, but exposed as gay. Eric and Jack dislike each other, but Jack becomes very supportive - until the truth of the complex network of betrayal emerges. Eric's downfall and Sara's agony over him and her flawed and adulterous relationship with Jack are movingly told. Choices have to be made, with tragic consequences. The last 30 pages return to Kate, and her reactions, and how these revelations about the past help to shift her own entrenched obstinacies. The Pursuit of Happiness is a most ironic title for this thoughtful, involving book, but a wiser Kate will continue to try to 'make things work'. (Kirkus UK)