Sasa Hanten: Talent for Happiness

Sasa Hanten tells the story of two highly privileged individuals in their early thirties whose lives appear successful on the outside but are in a state of flux internally. Charlotte Maybach, a notary, efficient, desirable, and socially elevated, experiences her overachievement as a dead end. Eby Tusch, a homosexual heir to a fairground business, has cared for his demented father for years and lost his true love. Care, farewell, and unfulfilled longing become the reason for a radical self-examination.

The novel does not rely on crisis but on a thought process. During a two-week break – fasting, conversations, days removed from time – Charlotte and Eby devise a solution that eludes common categories: beyond romantic couple narratives, beyond heteronormative and homonormative expectations, beyond familial certainties. What emerges is a chosen affinity that rethinks friendship, loyalty, care, and reproduction.

Sasa Hanten combines a study of social milieus with laconic wit and analytical sharpness. Talent for Happiness is a novel about happiness not as a feeling but as a design – about dignity in dealing with the unchangeable, about life forms that only become possible through thought.