When a well-to-do extended English family find their perfect escape from the pressures of the city, a 17th Century château awaiting renovation in a quiet corner of rural France, everything is très bon. They are welcomed into the commune, make new friends, and enjoy the peaceful, rustic lifestyle – until a powerful politician with a Machiavellian agenda sets out to ruin them. Against a backdrop of intrigue, blackmail, and skeletons of Nazi collaboration from World War II, the evils of corruption envelop their Gallic dream in Le Château: A Very French Affair. It’s both a cautionary tale and a spot-on study of what can happen when friendly, well-meaning outsiders – in this case a clan of Londoners – try to become insiders in a land with a very foreign culture. The author, Nick Hampton, a dual English-Australian national, wrote the novel from a position of great insight: his own home in the south of France.
Nick Hampton had a long international career as a music industry executive and managing director in London, Europe, the USA and Australia. He was involved with Petula Clark, Elton John, The Kinks, Tony Hatch, Jackie Trent, Donovan, Sandie Shaw, Johnny Cash, Andy Williams, Tony Bennett, Vera Lynn, Slim Dusty, Neil Finn, Jimmy Barnes and other leading artists. Music also brought him into contact with legendary business figures such as Lew Grade, Dick James, Clive Davis and Ted Albert, who was pivotal in AC/DC’s breakthrough. LE CHÂTEAU: A VERY FRENCH AFFAIR is his first novel. He lives in retirement with his wife in the south of France.
* LE CHÂTEAU: A VERY FRENCH AFFAIR is an international “seachange” novel about innocents abroad that brims with waves of skullduggery.
* It will appeal to Australian readers with an interest in French life, culture, and the often quirky and puzzling Gallic customs – especially those who have ever entertained the getaway dream of finding a new life in a romanticised château in the French countryside.
* Readers who enjoyed such bestsellers as Sarah Turnbull’s Almost French or Peter Mayle’s A Year in Provence will be drawn to this latest addition in the highly popular genre of “Expat French” literature, to which Nick Hampton brings a new dimension of suspense and intrigue.
* Amid the plotting and the treachery, the hopes and the heartaches, a picture forms of a real-life, 21st Century culture clash as the story twists and turns to its surprising climax. There is genuine truth in this novel masked by veneers of fiction applied by an expatriate author who knows his subject and his French territory all too well.
* The novel is being widely distributed to book reviewers.
* Online marketing by the publisher will feed off a dedicated website, Facebook pages and extensive social media support for the novel.
* Further media coverage of the author will be sought, to capitalise on the publicity campaign that attracted radio interviews for his previous book, the non-fiction memoir NICK OF TIME: MY LIFE AND CAREER, ALL ON THE RECORD, which was taken up by bookstores in 2020.
