Funny, funny, funny
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Having spent a year in France as a newbie to the language and customs I found this highly entertaining and related to many aspects. Funny and useful combined in a quick read - a good spend.
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I didn't really get it
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The blurb on the back makes out that this is the diary of a year in the life of an englishman living in Paris. It suggests, with its quote from the Times about it being more edgy than Bryson and Peter Mayle that it is true. The author, inside, suggests that some of it is true, probably and it reads like a ladlit novel.
I thought it was fairly poorly written, not massively entertaining and a book which enjoys exploiting the stereotype of the French character without being in the slightest bit hard hitting or edgy. The main character comes across as wildly unsympathetic, fairly amoral and rather dull, and I learned nothing about French life that I didn't already know.
I think the marketing is misleading and the book below par.
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Merde - he said it!
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Rarely did the title of a book correspond so accurately to the experience of reading it. It is initially amusing but quickly heads for the sex in a bid to maintain the interest of its target audience which, I presume, is solipsistic teenage males. I rarely give up on books: it goes against the grain to abandon one. However, in this case I'm going to have to do just that. I've persevered for months with this nonsense but I've decided that my year in this fantasist's merde is over.
It's so poor that it's not even going to Oxfam lest some unsuspecting customer is taken in as I was by the blurb. No, the only thing for it is to use our outside loo to give it an appropriate send-off, page by merde-y page.
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Highly entertaining
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This was such fun my husband and I ended up reading the whole book allowed to each other. We were given it by a French friend and have recommended it to other friends from Paris. Clarke is quite self deprocating enough about himself and English culture to justify equally honest comments on his experiences in Paris.
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An Antidote to Travel Books
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This is a truly funny book. It grabs you by the (well they're described in the book) from the very fist page. The humour is well sustained throughout - a trick many 'humour' writers fail at.
It is an 'adult' book, but this is carried through very well, and doesn't get tasteless (although maybe your maiden aunt might disagree).
I've never lived or worked in France, but I'd guess that if you were thinking of doing so, then this would be essential reading.
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