Not Quite Nice

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Quite is a degree adverb. It has two meanings depending on the word that follows it: ‘a little, moderately but not very’ and ‘very, totally or completely’: In this delightful story, Imrie gives the reader a cast of (mostly) charming characters: a widowed ex-actress, a pair of gay men, a narcissistic elderly woman with a flair for cutting remarks, an apparently loving American couple, an Australian lothario and his jealous wife, a timid mother and her bullying son, an ex-prisoner, a self-centred daughter and her three spoiled children, a long-absent hippy son, an over-achieving daughter and a mysterious woman who claims to be recuperating. Shelve this book under "middle-aged woman rediscovers zest in her life" and "English people misbehaving abroad". This is light-hearted escapism, starting when Theresa, on a whim, buys a house in a lovely seaside town on the Riviera. The small community of English-speaking expatriates, embraces the new arrival, and soon Theresa is enjoying her new life. But it's not all baguettes and vin blanc , and drug dealers, con men and corporate spies soon appear on the scene. When we use quite with a non-gradable adjective or adverb (an extreme adjective or adverb has a maximum and/or minimum, for example right – wrong), it usually means ‘very’, ‘totally’ or ‘completely’: The main focus of the story is the characters, loveable eccentrics who you feel you’d love to meet and chat to. The plot is straight forward, with no great surprises, but enough to make an amusing and readable tale.

Nice Series: : Celia Imrie: Bloomsbury Publishing The Nice Series: : Celia Imrie: Bloomsbury Publishing

I can't say this was particularly well written - it seems that towards the end, the author just wanted to get this book done and get all the stories wrapped up, which led to some really implausible and far-fetched revelations. The characters, especially the children of two of the female characters, were caricatures of entitlement and nastiness. And there were a lot of characters!

In her debut novel, Imrie has given us a sort of “coming of old age” story. I loved Theresa, though I wanted to shake her a few times when she put up with bad treatment by her ungrateful, selfish daughter and her bratty grandchildren. Still, this is a woman who has always done her best and who is slowly but surely realizing that she deserves some pleasure in life. The cast of supporting characters was marvelous as well: the smooth and attentive Brian; Sally a former British TV star; Americans Carol and David; “dragon lady” Sian and her philandering Aussie husband Ted; the witty, seemingly never aging octogenarian Zoe; compliant Faith and her pushy son Alfie who insists she needs a mansion rather than the small flat she’d prefer; and gay couple Benjamin and William. I quite like tennis but I can never play proper games because I can’t serve. (I like tennis a bit.)

Not Quite Nice by Celia Imrie | Goodreads

We often use not quite to mean ‘not completely’. We can use it with adjectives, adverbs, nouns, non-finite clauses, prepositional phrases and wh-clauses: This is an awful thing to say and I’ll probably get into trouble for it, but I slightly shy away when I hear an English voice in Nice. I want to stay in my little bubble of French life. So no, I don’t really know English people out here at all, which is how I like it. When we use quite with a gradable adjective or adverb, it usually means ‘a little, moderately but not very’. It has a similar meaning to ‘rather’ or ‘fairly’: The Olivier award-winning actor Celia Imrie, best known for film roles in Calendar Girls and The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, is about to publish her first novel, Not Quite Nice. A comic caper set among the tangled lives of a group of expats in a southern French village, Imrie wrote most of it at her own apartment in Nice.This debut from national treasure actress Celia perfectly captures the colour of ex-pat life and the glitz and glamour of the South of France. A shaft of early summer sunshine, a funny, spirited read ( Daily Mail) Theresa is desperate for a change. Forced into early retirement, tired of babysitting her bossy daughter's obnoxious children, she sells her house and moves to a picture-perfect town, just outside Nice.