The Parisien now wants to be a paysan, but it's easier said than done . . . How do you plant leeks in cement-hard French soil, impress Gallic neighbours with your non-existent gardening credentials and survive a seven-hour celebratory communion lunch (followed by dinner)? What skills are required to cope with suicidal French mice (souricide?), resist the advances of an attractive but desperate lady cheese-maker during an English lesson, buy wine from Mr Grump the grower, and -- last but not least -- stoop so low as to snap up the plastic trophy in the annual garden competition? AN ENGLISHMAN A LA CAMPAGNE is a wonderfully warm and witty follow-up to the author's account of his first year living in Paris. Now broadening his affectionate embrace to include the myriad facets of the French countryside, Sadler makes you laugh, makes you think, and makes you love the place . . . even Donges, which won first prize in his competition for the grottiest village in France.

Love in deepest France . . . After the romantic encounter in the Loire Valley bathroom at the end of AN ENGLISHMAN A LA CAMPAGNE Sadler dumps the University of Swindon and returns to France intent on winning the heart of Lou Charpin, his belle française. Easier said than done. Unsure of his credentials he decides to woo her family at the same time . . . playing Scrabble with the fiesty, Craven A-smoking grandmother; lending his farmhouse to his future chaud lapin (hot rabbit?) of a brother-in-law; explaining King Lear to an adolescent more intent on sowing birdseed in his window boxes; surviving a Greek Tragedy-style family Christmas, at which he foolishly translates jokes from crackers, and - le comble de l'arrogance - weening Lou Charpin away from her French copain, a plutocratic optician who is less than appreciative of rivalry from the barbaric north . . . How do you love à la française? Are they better at it than us? That is the question. Sadler watches the late-night movie - an erotic encounter between a luscious cleaning lady and a Parisian dermatologist - and takes copious notes. After the Latin lover is it now the moment for the 'rosbif' Romeo? In AN ENGLISHMAN AMOUREUX, all is revealed.