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Paul Martin gave up an academic life as a behavioural biologist to write. He has tackled common but puzzling topics, such as sleep, with the insight of a scientist. In Making Happy People (Harper Perennial, £8.99), he unpicks what we know about happiness. He concentrates on how and what we can do to make children happy. He points out that we have paid scant attention to this subject: over a period of just under 30 years, 90,000 papers were published on depression, anger and anxiety, but just 5000 on joy and happiness.