"A brutally funny, sharply written, and ultimately tender and devastating exploration of our eternal search for love, belief, belonging. This book will shock, tickle and gut you at the same time. If that’s your idea of happiness—and it’s definitely mine—I Was Happy will make you very happy." —Sam Lipsyte, author of No One Left to Come Looking For You

“I Was Happy is dark, subversive, and completely hilarious. Alec Gewirtz is a major talent, and his sentences are so sly and clever I kept going back to reread them. I haven’t had this much fun with a novel in years.” — Kimberly King Parsons, National Book Award-nominated author of Black Light

“I Was Happy is a blistering satire of contemporary sex, spirituality, and digital anomie. But Alec Gewirtz isn’t just kidding around. His narrator’s addled schemes and secret shames (and shameful secrets) are all forms of genuine seeking and yearning, albeit for the wrong things in the wrong places in the wrong ways. The result is a smart, searching, propulsive comic novel that, indeed, made me happy.” —Justin Taylor, author of Reboot

"A rollicking journey through the sacred and profane." —Zoe Dubno, author of Happiness and Love