Book Release – What have we got Toulouse? A family moving to France

I am so excited.  My new book about moving to France as a family, “What have we got Toulouse?” Is now available.  I can’t believe I’ve finally got there! 

Why write a book about moving to France?

I started writing back in 2011, seven years after moving to France and it’s been through many versions and adaptations in that time.  When we were first considering moving to France back in 2003 I read every book on living in France I could get my hands on.  They were all interesting, but none of them gave me an insight into what it would be like living as a family in France, having a baby in France, schools in France, making friends in France and making a living in France.  All the books I read were written largely by retirees and I knew the picture they were painting of quaint villages, bistros, markets and cafes was very different to the life we would be experiencing. 

I vowed to myself that one day I would write the book that I would love to have read and found most useful.

Finding the time to write about moving to France

I started writing in the Spring of 2011 and once I started I couldn’t stop, the words kept flowing.  Our lives in France were pretty hectic, what with five children, several businesses and a large house to manage.  Most of my writing was done during the early hours of the morning when I couldn’t sleep and now I tend to write in the evenings (instead of watching TV). I soon found that the number of experiences I had to share was too immense for just one book, and I would never get it finished.  Then of course major life events just kept on coming and coming (as they tend to do). I had many stops and starts in the nine years it’s taken me to get this far. 

However, despite all that here I am leaping over the publishing hurdle and the result is my first book in the “A mother in France” series – What have we got Toulouse? A family moving to France.

Our story of moving to France

We have had so many experiences over the past sixteen years.  This first book covers three main areas of our lives in France:

• Why we decided to move to France – the period before moving to France and the events which led us to make the decision to move.  We had many setbacks and difficulties to overcome before we even started our journey. 
• How we moved to France – how we went about finding our home, why we chose it and the buying process.  It was a fun but challenging time.
• What it was like living in France – covering the major events of our first five years in France – sorting schools, doctors, building, developing land, starting businesses, learning the language and much more.

What next?

The next book, with a working title of “No time Toulouse, a family living in France”, focuses largely on the events of years five to ten of living in France.  I’ll be going into more detail about the Education system and our experiences with all five of our children in the various types of schools, further and higher Education with comparisons between the UK and France.  I’ll also be delving more into the various businesses we’ve started and run and sharing tips and some of the pitfalls to avoid.  This period also covers challenging topics and the start of some serious health issues for one of our sons.

The working title of the third book in the series is “Refusing Toulouse, a family surviving in France” and will cover years eleven to fifteen, where we overcome some incredible hurdles, get involved with volunteering to help with the spiralling refugee crisis and come face to face with life-threatening situations and personal loss.

The fourth book is currently life in the making… it looks like “A family Locked down in France” might be an appropriate title…  Let’s see how it pans out!

“What have we got Toulouse? A family moving to France” is available from Amazon in paperback and Kindle format.