{
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  "title": "Detour de France",
  "subtitle": null,
  "slug": "detour-de-france",
  "url": "https://www.bookquiver.com/michael-simkins/detour-de-france",
  "json": "https://www.bookquiver.com/michael-simkins/detour-de-france.json",
  "markdown": "https://www.bookquiver.com/michael-simkins/detour-de-france.md",
  "authors": [
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      "name": "Michael Simkins",
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  "language": "en_GB",
  "original_title": null,
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  "first_published": "2009-05-27",
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  "description": "Though happy enough with his lot, Michael Simkins has never truly shaken the nagging doubt - helpfully upheld by his partner Julia - that he somehow lacks worldly sophistication. While she spent her teenage years as a nanny on a boat moored at Cannes, his utter lack of travel experience (Weymouth, Cleethorpes and a day trip to Dieppe) still has the power to shock people into leaving dinner parties early. So as he hits middle-age, Michael takes up the challenge of broadening his horizons. He decides to improve himself in the same way English gentlemen lacking refined edges have for centuries: by learning from our more cultured French neighbours. Michael, an English provincial ingénue , sets off to discover just what the Gallic nation can teach him and the rest of us Anglo-Saxons about living the good life. Armed only with 50 Useful Phrases in French , he waits to see if his odyssey from La Manche to the Riviera will finally turn him from the scotch-egg eating spawn of Anne Widdecombe and John McCririck into the champagne-sipping love child of Serge Gainsbourg and Catherine Deneuve. Julia is saying a prayer for him at Lourdes.",
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      "title": "Detour de France",
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      "url": "https://www.bookquiver.com/michael-simkins/detour-de-france/9780091927530",
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      "isbn": "978-00-9192-753-0",
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    {
      "title": "Detour de France",
      "subtitle": null,
      "url": "https://www.bookquiver.com/michael-simkins/detour-de-france/9781407027463",
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      "isbn": "978-14-0702-746-3",
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