Happiness for Beginners

BookPage calls Katherine Center "the reigning queen of comfort reads." She's the New York Times bestselling author of over half a dozen books, including How to Walk Away, Things You Save in a Fire, and What You Wish For. Katherine writes laugh-and-cry books about how life knocks us down-and how we get back up. She's been compared to both Jane Austen and Nora Ephron, and the Dallas Morning News calls her stories, "satisfying in the most soul-nourishing way." Her books have made countless Best-Of lists, including RealSimple's Best Books of 2020, Amazon's Top 100 Books of 2019, Goodreads' Best Books of the Year, and many more. Bestselling author Emily Henry calls her summer 2022 book, The Bodyguard, "a shot of pure joy." The movie adaptation of Katherine's novel The Lost Husband (starring Josh Duhamel) hit #1 on Netflix, and her novel Happiness for Beginners is in production now as a Netflix original starring Ellie Kemper. Katherine lives in her hometown of Houston, Texas, with her husband, two kids, and their fluffy-but-fierce dog.

"Center has written a wonderful story, a fast-paced read with sharp, perfectly written dialogue. Her newest does exactly what we want a good novel to do, introduce us to characters who engage us and take us on a journey." -Booklist

"If you're anything like us, you'll read this book in one sitting." -InStyle

"Katherine Center has a true gift for creating a story arc that includes personal evolution, romance, challenges, disappointments, and joy in a way that avoids cliché and creates enough ebbing tension and resolution that the reader is left hungering for more." -Boston Mamas

"Center has a gift for snappy, engaging dialogue that frequently had me laughing aloud." -Lone Star Lit

"This wise, delicious, page-turning novel won't let you go. Katherine Center writes about falling down, growing up, and finding love like nobody else. You can always see yourself and the people you love in her characters and their stories." -Brené Brown, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Daring Greatly

"Happiness for Beginners is my favorite Katherine Center novel yet. I folded down pages to go back to--and that's a sign of a great book: when I see something so true or profound that I know I need mark it. It's wonderful. Could not put it down." -Jenny Lawson, New York Times bestselling author of Let's Pretend This Never Happened

"Happiness for Beginners does what a story should do-introduces characters we want to know and then takes us on their unexpected journey to a new and braver life. Helen Carpenter is doing what needs to be done, and along the way she shows us how to be brave . . . when we need to be and when we want to be. When life doesn't give Helen what she believes she wants, she journeys into the wilderness to find what she needs, and we are with her every step of the way. Center's witty, honest and compassionate storytelling opens us to new ways of feeling and trusting, just as her character is doing the same." -Patti Callahan Henry, New York Times