Lives with the French in insular places (5)
I believe the answer is:
isles
'insular places' is the definition.
Although both the answer and definition are plural nouns, I cannot understand how one could define the other.
'lives with the french' is the wordplay.
'lives' becomes 'is' ('be' can be a synonym of 'live').
'with' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'the french' becomes 'les' (plural form of 'the' in French).
'is'+'les'='ISLES'
'in' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for isles that I've seen before include "British locations, say?" , "Archipelago" , "Eyots" , "- - of Scilly" , "eg The Hebrides" .)