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Dreaming In Dijon: A Wish Fulfilled

by Alan Shattock

172 pages; quality trade paperback (softcover); catalogue #08-0270; ISBN 1-4251-7243-1; US$17.57, C$17.57, EUR12.00, £9.07

The humorous story of the author's plunge into house purchase in France, a wonderful account of village and family life at play and the importance of the French rural neighbourly lifestyle.

About the Book

Visitors to France spend relaxing evenings in street-side restaurants enjoying the ambiance, food and wine and dream of a getaway place in France, but it is usually just that, a dream, seldom acted upon.

While on such a visit to France, self-confessed Francophile, Alan Shattock and his wife, Sandra, took the plunge and bought an old belle maison française in the small Burgundy village of Charry-sur-Saône, near Dijon. This is an amusing, true and quirky story of the amazing coincidences and events before and after the purchase, the practicalities and disasters, and of villagers who came to the rescue. It is an engaging memoir that shares with readers the author’s experiences of buying a place in France and of becoming accepted into the community. It gives positive encouragement and justification to those who dare to ignore the cautions given on television about buying that Place in the France, and especially to those who dare to do so when armed with little French.

Alan Shattock recounts the extraordinary series of seemingly fatalistic coincidences that led to the eventual purchase of la belle maison, and, along the way enthuses about the influences of his parents during childhood visits to Burgundy in search of wine dealers. It is a wonderful account of village and family life at the table and at play and, above all, it is an illustration of the importance of the French lifestyle, the Gallic sense of friendship, camaraderie and neighbourliness - splendidly described in “Dreaming in Dijon – A Wish Fulfilled”.

About the Author

Alan Shattock is an English-born medical scientist who has lived and worked in Ireland for over forty years. Until now, his substantial writings have been published in scientific journals. This is his first contribution to travel literature. He lives with Sandra somewhere between Connemara in Ireland and Charrey-sur-Saône in France!

Excerpts