What do You think about A Breath Of French Air (2006)?
https://www.goodreads.com/photo/user/... back cover The fun is the boisterous conviviality and relaxed joy in traditional "sins". Ma 36 p 15 hankers for France, heat. Pop wants grandkids. So all ten Larkins flee their beloved junkyard England home in chilly wet August. Son-in-law "Charley" Charleton primes all with bon mots phrases a bientôt from his childhood remembered sunny seaside, drunkenly bursts beachballs athletic suitors "float towards .. every five minutes" p 73" his topless tanning new wife Marriette. Air is first stormy cold, tea straw-color weak, food tough, beef outside "charred .. [bloody] icy blue inside" p 81, bills overpriced "breathing charge" p 83.Ma's jolly bouncing bulk nurses newborn Oscar, squashes wicker chair, advises Pop "equal shares" p 182 among admirers, "variety" including elegant silk and cashmere clad Angela Snow, and custom sews her own bikinis. Pop admires landlady Mlle Dupont for black corset and Lily of the Valley muguet-scent. She notes Pop's bachelor passport and calls him "milord" for fancy monogrammed Rolls Royce, eccentricities. Attentive "golden and aristocratic" p 89 Angela encourages her to ask him about "his home is his castle" p 120.French women and children are pallid, unkempt, spotty, unfeminine sticks, far from fashionable. Servers are "unclean, uncut .. belly both hairy and sweaty" p 80 rude, filthy, far from cultured. Pokes fun at "très snob" p 81. Then Exaggerated "young men .. magnificent .. tall, athletic, bronzed and lissom. Innumerable protruding knots of muscle .. hair was always perfectly crimped and waved ..middles wore nothing but skin-tight pudding bags tied with string .. tirelessly exercising" p 70. Get drunk, amorous, and embrace physical pleasures. Pop concocts cocktails, improves "innocuous" looking punch, so everyone enjoys final "delectable" p 130 feast, 29 Aug Charley and Mariette's first anniversary festivities. Angela nearly kisses heads shorter hotel clerk Mr Mollett "bang in the center of the forehead" p 148, but "for keeps" p 150 Pop instead. Her strict preachy sister Iris, diet of anchovy paste on dry toast, claims "France is my mecca. Everything .. adored .. its food" p 143. On the moonlit beach, she "surrendered gladly" p 145. X-rating for topic, not delivery.Book ends with feeding "a wide handsome spread of maternal bosom exposed, ready to give Ma decides to christen "Oscar Columbus Septimus Dupont Larkin a little drop of the best" p 159. Invited to attend christening as godmother, Mlle Dupont does, I remember. Precocious Primrose 11 stays with "boyfriend" Marc-Antoine 12 p 137. Re-reading Larkin may be saturated to excess.
—An Odd1
