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Almost French
On sale
9th August 2018
Price: £10.99
Almost French takes readers on a tour fraught with culture clashes but rife with insight and deadpan humour – a charming true story of what happens when a strong-willed Aussie girl meets a very French Frenchman.
Backpacking around Europe, twenty-something Sarah Turnbull meets Frederic and impulsively accepts his invitation to visit him for a week in Paris. Eight years later, she is still there – and married to him. The feisty journalist swaps vegemite for vichyssoise and all things French, but commits the fatal errors of bowling up to strangers at classy receptions, helping herself to champagne, laughing too loudly and (quelle horreur!) rushing out for a baguette in her ‘pantalons de jogging’. But Paris’ maddening, mysterious charm proves irresistible and Sarah makes spectacular progress. She finds work as a freelance journalist, learns to survive Parisian dinner parties and how to deal with grim-faced officialdom.
As she navigates the highs and lows of Parisian life, covering the haute couture fashions shows and discovering the hard way the paradoxes of France today, Sarah succeeds in becoming ‘almost French’.
Backpacking around Europe, twenty-something Sarah Turnbull meets Frederic and impulsively accepts his invitation to visit him for a week in Paris. Eight years later, she is still there – and married to him. The feisty journalist swaps vegemite for vichyssoise and all things French, but commits the fatal errors of bowling up to strangers at classy receptions, helping herself to champagne, laughing too loudly and (quelle horreur!) rushing out for a baguette in her ‘pantalons de jogging’. But Paris’ maddening, mysterious charm proves irresistible and Sarah makes spectacular progress. She finds work as a freelance journalist, learns to survive Parisian dinner parties and how to deal with grim-faced officialdom.
As she navigates the highs and lows of Parisian life, covering the haute couture fashions shows and discovering the hard way the paradoxes of France today, Sarah succeeds in becoming ‘almost French’.
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Reviews
A funny, heart-warming, romantic and poignant tale of fitting in... will appeal to the latest generation of Francophiles dreaming of starting a new life in France.
An entertaining tale of being a fish out of water in one of the most magical cities in the world.
Turnbull pulls no punches when it comes to describing life among her new countrymen and is refreshingly direct about her own failings as perceived by the Parisians. Required reading for anyone contemplating a spot of French leave.
Best, most seductive and funniest travel memoir this summer is Sarah Turnbull's Almost French, a novel twist on an Australian twenty-something back-packer's romantic liaison with a very French Frenchman and the howling differences in language, customs and expected behaviour.