The Bonjour Effect: The Secret Codes of French Conversation Revealed. Dieser Artikel ist nicht verfügbar.The Bonjour Effect: The Secret Codes of French Conversation Revealed

Jean-Benoît Nadeau and Julie Barlow spent a decade traveling back and forth to Paris as well as living there. Yet one important lesson never seemed to sink in: how to communicate comfortably with the French, even when you speak their language. In The Bonjour Effect Jean-Benoît and Julie chronicle the lessons they learned after they returned to France to live, for a year, with their twin daughters. They offer up all the lessons they learned and explain, in a book as fizzy as a bottle of the finest French champagne, the most important aspect of all: the French don't communicate, they converse. To understand and speak French well, one must understand that French conversation runs on a set of rules that go to the heart of French culture. Why do the French like talking about "the decline of France"? Why does broaching a subject like money end all discussion? Why do the French become so aroused debating the merits and qualities of their own language? Through encounters with school principals, city hall civil servants, gas company employees, old friends and business acquaintances, Julie and Jean-Benoît explain why, culturally and historically, conversation with the French is not about communicating or being nice. It's about being interesting. After reading The Bonjour Effect, even readers with a modicum of French language ability will be able to hold their own the next time they step into a bistro on the Left Bank.

Canadian journalist-author JULIE BARLOW is a regular contributor to Montreal public affairs magazine L'actualité. Her writing has appeared in magazines and newspapers in the U.S. Canada and Europe, including the New York Times, USA Today, Toronto Star, and the International Herald Tribune. In 2003, Barlow published an international bestseller Sixty Million Frenchmen Can't Be Wrong with her husband and co-author Jean-Benoît Nadeau. In 2006 the couple published the critical success The Story of French. They've also released The Story of Spanish.

Canadian journalist-author JEAN-BENOÎT NADEAU is an award-winning contributor to L'actualité. Writings with his life partner, JULIE BARLOW, have appeared in the Toronto Star, the Ottawa Citizen, Saturday Night, The Christian Science Monitor and the International Herald Tribune, among others. In 2003, Nadeau and Barlow published their critical and popular success, Sixty Million Frenchmen Can't Be Wrong. They live in Montreal.