Component travel memoir, component humor, and part twisted self-help guideline, The Geography of Bliss uses the reader across the globe to research not what happiness is, but WHERE it is.

Are people in Switzerland more happy because it is the most democratic nation in the world? Do residents of Qatar, awash in petrodollars, find joy in all that cash? May be the Ruler of Bhutan a visionary for his effort to calculate Gross National Happiness? Why is Asheville, NEW YORK so damn happy?

In a distinctive mix of travel, psychology, science and humor, Eric Weiner answers those questions and many more, offering travelers of most moods some interesting fresh ideas for sunnier destinations and dispositions.