Language is different in real life than it is in literature, so part of my intermediate French reading practice is following blogs and magazines. A surprisingly deep source of weirdness that I have become very fond of is Vogue France.
My first thought about high fashion is usually that it is toxic– misogynist and body-fascist– but to its credit, it is also very strange. A way to get most of the weirdness and a minimum of the poison is to follow the vogue.fr RSS feed. It contains very few and very tiny photos, and a seemingly random selection of their incredible headlines.
What is amazing about Vogue France headlines? They are clearly written in French, but they contain hardly any French words. This is mind-melting and I feel certain that learning how to make French phrases out of English slang is improving my grasp of French grammar.
A recent example:
Tendance dad shoes : 13 sneakers normcore ultra mode
You get to learn French words for “trend” and “fashion”, but after that it is only the word order that distinguishes this from the English equivalent, “Dad shoes trend: 13 ultra fashionable normcore sneakers”.