A Year in the Merde - Stephen Clarke

     2005; 276 pages.  New Author? : No, but it’s been a while.  Book 1 (out of 6) in the “Paul West” series.  Genres : Humorous Fiction; France; British Humor.  Overall Rating : 8½*/10.

 

    Paul West has just landed a great new job!  His new company wants him to head a team that will develop a chain of English tea rooms in France.  They are betting it’s going to be the next big thing.

 

    Paul was recruited because his last job was overseeing the development of a chain of French cafés in England.  Under his guidance, thirty-five new cafés were opened there.  His new employers hope he can duplicate that feat for them, but with English tea.  His new company, VianDiffusion, has organized a crack team for him to supervise.  The target is to open the first tea room a year from now.

 

    Of course, Paul will have to relocate to Paris, at least for the first year, but that shouldn’t be a problem.  He speaks a little bit of French, and has been assured that each of his team members speaks some English.  At 27 years old, Paul is eager for a corporate challenge, and anxious to work his charm of Parisian girls.  What could go wrong?

 

    Well, there’s a reason this book is titled A Year in the Merde.

 

What’s To Like...

   There are nine chapters in A Year in the Merde, with each covering a month of Paul’s life as he learns the tricks to living, working, and socializing in France.  We start with “Septembre”, which the French consider the beginning of the work year, when everybody is returning from three months worth of vacation, and go through “Mai”, when everyone goes back on vacation again.  For the most part, the story takes place in and around Paris, apparently in 2003-04, just after the West's second invasion of Iraq.

 

    The book is written in the first-person POV, Paul's, and is full of both self-deprecating humor (Stephen Clarke used to write comedy sketches for BBC-Radio) and keen insight into French culture (the author had also previously worked for a French press group).  The book reads like a memoir, but it’s not, although I suspect Clarke drew heavily from his own Anglo-Franco experiences.

 

    Stephen Clarke is a British author, so the text is replete with English expressions, which means you can doss down with toffs, engage in hoovering, wear your wellies, and freeze your bollocks off.  But the spellings have been “translated” into American, so you specialize, not specialise, in something.  Naturally, there is also a lot of French vocabulary for Paul (and the reader) to sift through.  It helps if you know a bit of French, but you don’t have to be fluent in it.

 

    I enjoyed Paul’s visit to Montmartre (I’ve been there and it is awesome!), chuckled at the name of Paul’s previous company, “Voulez-Vous Café Avec Moi”, and guffawed at the reference to “Monsieur Stid” of the old TV show, The Avengers.  GMOs play a part in story, as does the threat of Mad Cow Disease in British beef, the French being dead set against both of these.  Marijuana gets a brief mention, as does the esoteric chemical “paracetamol”.

 

    The ending is good, albeit somewhat tame.  Paul’s work-year is done, and he has mixed feelings as he prepares to spend the upcoming summer back in England.  Despite his best efforts, he has become Frenchified.  The book closes at a logical spot: Paul has learned how to do business in France, and sets up Book Two in the series, Merde Actually, where Paul experiences another year of cultural enlightenment.  I read Book 2 back in 2012; it is reviewed here.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Swish (adj., British) : fashionable, posh, sophisticated, expensive.

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.2/5 based on 404 ratings.

    Goodreads: 3.54/5 based on 14,279 ratings and 1,249 reviews.

 

Excerpts...

    The half-baguette was filled with slices of a suspicious-looking gray brown substance.

    “Sausage?” (…)

    “Yes.”

    I took one bite and spat it back in the foil.

    “It tastes – it smells – of merde!”

    Alexa thought this was hugely funny.  “Oh, please.  Not your favorite subject again.  This is the typical andouille.”

    She explained how they made it.  I took a swig of beer to clean my teeth.  Apparently, I’d just bitten into a pig’s rectum.  (pg. 59)

 

    Today it [the Arc de Triomphe] stands majestically astride a small island in the middle of one of Europe’s largest roundabouts, which is known as l’Etoile, or “the Star”.  The roundabout has twelve exits and is a massive quarter of a mile in diameter, which gives cars plenty of room to dash in at least twelve different directions at once.  As a star, l’Etoile is part black hole, part supernova.  Cars are sucked in, bounced crazily around, then expelled along one of the exits.  (pg. 139)

 

In France, cutting your lettuce when it’s on your plate is punishable by death. (pg. 107)

    There isn’t much to quibble about in A Year in the Merde.  There’s a fair amount of cussing, in both French and English (10 instances in the first 10% of the book), but then again, the title has “Merde” in it, so cusswords are to be expected.  There’s a bunch of references to sexual situations, but nothing lurid.

 

    Most of the French girls in the story can’t seem to wait to pounce on Paul and get him into bed, and some reviewers found this off-putting.  I admit that this didn’t seem realistic, but it makes for an interesting storyline, and to be fair, most of the femmes eventually get the better of Paul.

 

    Other reviewers were offended by all the pokes Stephen Clarke aims at French culture, and while that’s certainly true, it should be noted that he takes a lot of jabs at English culture as well, particularly when it comes to cuisine and culinary habits.

 

    A Year in the Merde was a treat for me.  I took 3 years of French at the local community college about 20 years ago, and have traveled to France three times, each trip lasting about a week.  My command of French is roughly equal to Paul’s, and a lot of things he encounters – such as stuffy waiters, striking workers, and communication difficulties – are things I experienced as well.  The book brought back fond memories, and for that I’m grateful.

 

    8½ Stars.  I was surprised to learn that Stephen Clarke has written another dozen or so books, half of them fiction, half of them non-fiction, all of them about France and/or England, and all of them humorous.  It is a rare treat to find his books at my local used-book stores, but I intend to go looking for some more of his works, just as soon as this pandemic has run its course.