Along the way, readers will find the usual faces, events and themes of French history – Louis XIV, the French Revolution, the French Resistance, the Tour de France – but all presented in a shining new light.

For that really is the lingering impression of this book: in whatever ephemeral, run-of-the-mill place you happen to be, it may have been at one point either the location of a momentous event buried by the sands of time, or it may have been visited by — or was maybe even the home of — someone who enjoyed a moment of celebrity in some past era. FRANCE is an entertaining, though demanding, history of France, from the first-century BC to the present day.I enjoyed the chapters on both World Wars as well as the rather sad story of the Narcisse Pelletier (White Savage) and his experience of being stranded with a native tribe of Australian Aborigines.

Of all the essays in the book, this one felt most worthy of the adventure descriptor from the title.What he has done in this informative and hugely entertaining book is to interest himself in an generally unknown area, open it up and relate it to the broader history of France. I could do without the last quarter of the book’s pages comprising excessively copious notes and references. I was not interested in all of the chapters, but there were many that were very cool and covered interesting topic (my favorite was the one about the tree). The bloody, barbaric parts of France's history were disturbing and left me with more questions than answers. Less comprehensive and more episodic, the author has compiled stories surrounding historical events they find of interest, expounding on them as a storyteller might.