Hi, search in scalar context returns the resultset, not a record. Try:

my $client = resultset('Client')
      ->search( { 'client_id' => $id }, { join => ['country'], } )
      ->first;
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(Also note the DBIx doc recommends use of prefetch rather than join when your join includes all the columns from the joined table.)

https://metacpan.org/pod/DBIx::Class::ResultSet#search
https://metacpan.org/pod/distribution/DBIx-Class/lib/DBIx/Class/Manual/Joining.pod#Whole-related-objects

Hope this helps!