The Cambridge Illustrated History of France (Cambridge Illustrated Histories)

I've been something of a histroy buff all of my life. This has been mostly ancient Greek and Roman history and history of Britain. I decided a change of pace would be nice and to learn more of the development of the neighboring country of France. I'd been a great fan of the style of Simon Shama and his approach of emphasizing socio-economic developments along with the usual kings, queens and wars genre of histories of my 50's college days. Looking over the offerings of Amazon.com, I took a chance on Colin Jones "France" in the Cambridge Illustrated History series and am certainly glad I did. (I also like to look at pictures). This book is truly a story of the development of the peoples and the rough and tumble way they came to be a single nation by a series of chances and luck. All of this is presented with a view of the socio-economic patterns and the ebb and flow of the emerging culture. My English history bakground gave me a source of comparison as I read of similar developments of the French peoples across the channel. Such areas as the citizen and the law, equalizing of the privileged classes, enfranchisement for voting and the place of women in society. It was amazing to me that women did not have the right to vote until after the second world war in France. So much of Colin Jones informative writing is relevant to the place of the country in todays world: warts and all. I highly recommend the book for the approach to the subject that Mr. Jones takes and the flow of his writing craft that makes for easy, unencombered interesting reading.

Since I had just got back from a french river cruise that gave me a great exposure to France, this book proved to be very refreshing to read. I also had a very limited exposure to french history before reading this book.

Book came as described and very quickly

I'm starting a PhD in French in the fall, and our reading list recommended that students find their own general history of France to provide context to our future research. The text is well written and manages to provide specific details without losing sight of broader historical trends. Great for students or anyone interested in France in general!

Context: I'm not an academic or a scholar; I've been to France for several vacations and I'm taking my daughter for the first time this summer. I wanted to know more than the few pages in Fodor's. This books was perfect. It has intertesting illustrations, and is written at a level that a layperson can easily understand. It was engaging to read. I got a lot from it, and if you have an interest in France as a traveller, I imagine it would be time well spent for you as well.

I loved this book. It reads like a novel. I was amazed at much I didn't know about France's history. The author also doesn't just focus on the events and famous people but also describes what life was like for women and the peasants and the workers.

Didn't know very much about French history, but I do now! This book has lots of pictures giving more understanding to French history. This book also gives a time line in the back of the book, which is very helpful for understand French history.

I got this book to help me understand the history of France -- particularly why there was a mass immigration from France to Canada in the mid-1600s. I didn't get my answer. It touched on it in one brief sentence and then was gone again to the wars. If you want to know about all the wars, battles, etc., then this book is for you. If you want to know about the French people, look elsewhere. It throws out a lot of French phrases that aren't explained and mentions lines of nobility that aren't explained either. However, maybe my assumption is incorrect. I assume that any history of a place should reflect the day-to-day lives of its people, in addition to conflict, but not that conflict should be the only focus.