Scan barcode
binstonbirchill's review against another edition
3.0
La Belle France provides a cursory look at the history of France, it provides a brief overview the succession of rulers, their specific influence and military conquest/defeats alongside intermittent updates on overall culture. Paris is the obvious focal point throughout and you get to know more about the city itself than you do any particular person or era. While nothing is explored in depth, the snapshots into the different era's do provide a starting point for further research for those inclined to do so (I am). Writing a book of the history of France in 441 pages is not an easy task, the question, and my main complaint is, why stop at 441 pages? Surely, at the very least, Vercingetorix deserves the same, rather piddly, space, a paragraph, that Joan of Arc received. I think I'll leave it at that, otherwise I'll start worrying about whether those 6 commas in the previous sentence are grammatically correct.
stoicloofah's review against another edition
3.0
If you want to learn about French history, this is a solid read. As you might expect, it's long, but the author has a bit of spunk that gives it some life.
More...