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ABOUT THIS BOOK

PUBLISHER: Canongate Books

FORMAT: Paperback

ISBN: 9781847671288

RRP: £8.99

PAGES: 320

PUBLICATION DATE:
January 7, 2010

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The Optimist: One Man’s Search for the Brighter Side of Life

Laurence Shorter

Collapsing stock markets, melting ice caps, floods, tornadoes, terrorism …When it comes to bad news, we’ve never had it so good. Perhaps it is time to be a little more optimistic? That’s what Laurence Shorter decided. And that’s why he set himself the challenge of meeting the world’s most cheerful people. Surely with the help of Desmond Tutu, Richard Branson and Bill Clinton, Laurence can find the secret to inner happiness. But first things first – how on Earth is he going to get to meet them?

Reviews of The Optimist: One Man’s Search for the Brighter Side of Life

'Learning how Richard Branson remains eternally cheerful or how a Buddhist monk became known as 'the happiest man in the world' is pretty inspiring.' Metro

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Laurence Shorter

Laurence Shorter worked in the business world for a decade before making the move into writing and comedy in 2001. Since then he has done a one-man show at the Edinburgh Festival, written for the BBC, Channel 4, the Independent, Observer and opendemocracy.net, and toured some of the capital’s finest pubs as a comedy dancer. Laurence was born in New York and raised in Edinburgh. Today he lives in South London.