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THE HAPPINESS MACHINE
KATIE WILLIAMS
First published in hardback as
Tell the Machine Goodnight
The Borough Press
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
First published in Great Britain as Tell the Machine Goodnight by HarperCollinsPublishers 2018
Copyright © Katie Williams 2018
Cover design by Ellie Game © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2019
Cover photograph © Valentino Sani / Trevillion Images
Katie Williams asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
Source ISBN: 9780008265069
Ebook Edition © May 2019 ISBN: 9780008265052
Version: 2019-01-15
Praise for The Happiness Machine:
‘A master class in not losing sight of the human element . . . the kind of story that – in the subtlest of ways – can instruct us, and nourish us, and make us want to live and love a little better’
Matt Haig, New York Times Book Review
‘Between seasons of Black Mirror, look to Katie Williams’ debut novel’
Refinery29
‘Sharp and moving’
Publishers Weekly
‘Philosophical, funny, cleverly structured, unpredictable . . . the world-building is creative and completely convincing’
Gabrielle Zevin
‘My prescription for happiness is: “Sit still, read a book that can’t be classified by genre, and tell everyone.” I’m telling you, Katie Williams delivers. Part science fiction, part love story, part feminist manifesto. I never knew what was going to happen and, when I found out, I was always delighted’
Helen Ellis, New York Times
bestselling author of American Housewife
‘I loved [it] so much that I read it twice . . . It is sci-fi in its most perfect expression — no robots, no explosions, no car chases. Reading it is like having a lucid dream of six years from next week, filled with people you don’t know, but will’
NPR
‘How much control do we have over our own happiness – and would we be better off if we had the ability to nudge it just a little more? A captivating, thought-provoking and utterly charming novel about the elusive nature of happiness and the limits of both technology and our own self-knowledge’
Carolyn Parkhurst, author of Harmony and The Dogs of Babel
‘Filled with extraordinary writing, wish-they-existed characters, and unexpected narrative turns . . . will delight your mind and heart’
Courtney Maum, author of Touch and I am Having So Much Fun Here Without You
For Uly and Fia
Contents
Copyright
Praise
Dedication
4. SUCH A NICE AND POLITE YOUNG MAN
10. TELL THE MACHINE GOODNIGHT
Acknowledgements
About the Author
Also by Katie Williams
Apricity (archaic): the feeling of sun on one’s skin in the winter
The machine said the man should eat tangerines. It listed two other recommendations as well, so three in total. A modest number, Pearl assured the man as she read out the list that had appeared on the screen before her: one, he should eat tangerines on a regular basis; two, he should work at a desk that received morning light; three, he should amputate the uppermost section