My Idea of Happiness

Viktor has been different since birth. In an era when peace is just a distant memory, he has just one way of getting through life: he has to write it all down. A stunning debut on the timeless search for happiness.
Victor emerges into the world already broken. The best they can do for the stiff and crooked baby is wrap him in swaddling. Later, he has to wear a brace and it swiftly becomes evident that he might not be quite right in the head either. Most people don’t take him seriously. “Cretin!” they say when they want him out of the way. Victor loses his family in the war and is raised in the Parish of the Holy Sons of Mary. When it looks like the fighting might be over, he returns to the city of bridges, joining forces with a dog, a one-legged man and a redhead. The peculiar little group makes its home among the ruins, struggling to survive. But one day Victor's companions disappear. Left to his own devices, he sets out on his last great journey.
Victor is a one-off hero: a strange child whose soul-destroying loneliness, fragmented language and idiosyncratic outlook is shot through with an overwhelming sense of yearning. My Idea of Happiness is a bleak and haunting tale about the power of poetry; an unforgettable account from a world entirely unto itself.