We’re up to our binders in books, books, books. So in the interest of clearing the desk, here are a few short takes on some new titles. At the end of each description, we’ve added each book’s ISBN number — a sort of a Social Security number for books — which will help your bookseller locate the title, should you decide to buy it.
“Live Better South of the Border in Mexico”
(Fulcrum, $16.95)
“Mexico” Mike Nelson takes a Dutch-uncle approach in lending gringos and gringas 30 years’ worth of advice. 162 pages.
(ISBN 1-55591-394-6)
“Hidden Walt Disney World, Orlando and Beyond”
(Ulysses Press, $13.95)
The “Hidden” guidebook series is known for hot-peppering its pages with little arrows that point to a multitude of off-the-tourist-track sites. But this title appears to offer a diet virtually free of such spice. Less than a score of arrows locate hidden attractions, all of which live up to the “Beyond” part of the book’s title — some as “beyond” as St. Petersburg, more than 100 miles away. 312 pages.
(ISBN 1-56975-202-8)
“Staying Healthy in Asia, Africa
and Latin America”
(Moon Travel Handbooks, $11.95)
This fifth edition offers descriptions and prescriptions on topics such as constipation, menstruation, motorcycle accidents, broken bones, hepatitis, vomiting, leeches, intestinal worms, malaria and a host of other discomforts of travel in remote parts of the world. 198 pages.
(ISBN 1-56691-133-8)
“Silicon Valley Handbook”
(Moon Travel Handbooks, $15.95)
For dot.com geeks who’d rather know the way to San Jose (and Sunnyvale and Palo Alto and South Valley), even though San Francisco is a mere 40 miles north. 273 pages.
(ISBN 1-56691-196-6)
“Spanish for Dummies”
(IDG Books, $24.99)
If you can hold out till Chapter 20, page 335, you’ll get to the Ten Phrases That Make You Sound Fluent in Spanish. 398 pages and an audio CD. French version also available.
(ISBN 0-7645-5194-9)
“San Francisco Bizarro”
(St. Martin’s Griffin, $16.95)
You’re going to need all the leather you can get your hands on for this, the city that brings you: taxidermied mice in an upscale hardware store; lodgings where B&B stands for bed and bondage; a Jewish-Irish sports bar; retail guitars made out of toilet seats. Maybe that Moon book on Silicon Valley isn’t so geeky after all. 192 pages of this stuff.
(ISBN 0-312-20671-2)
“Sahara Overland: A Route and Planning Guide”
(Trailblazer Publications, $29.95)
Preparation, documentation and transportation in Morocco, Mauritania, Libya, Mali, Tunisia, Algeria, Niger, Chad and Egypt. And you thought there wasn’t anything in the desert. 510 pages, not including advertisements from outfitters.
(ISBN 1-873756-26-7)
“U.S. Flea Market Directory”
(St. Martin’s Griffin, $$15.95)
One man’s junk is just junk. But a whole nation full of it is a cottage industry of flea markets that have bitten all 50 states plus the D. of C. 410 pages.
(ISBN 0-312-26405-4)
“London Brussels”
(Cadogan/Globe Pequot Press, $14.95)
The Channel Tunnel Train, Eurostar, has connected London and Brussels for over six years; it’s about time a guidebook did. 282 pages with cover flaps of both cities’ subway systems.
(ISBN 1-86011-939-5)
“Las Vegas”
(Lonely Planet, $15.95)
You know it’s a whole new millennium when the series that earned its reputation guiding sandal-wearing granola-eaters on budget backpacking treks through undeveloped countries now advises how to dine in “five-star” restaurants — in the most overdeveloped city in the world. 240 pages with lots of color photographs, map grids and a plug for a new type of phone card.
(ISBN 1-86450-086-7)
“Mini Rough Guide: Jerusalem”
(Penguin, $9.95)
A bookstore owner once told me that Rough Guides had to be the best travel series because it had more words per page than any of the others. But as this very description herein proves, you can roll out a lot of words before ever getting to the point. And without further ado, the point is that Rough Guides does a deft job of trimming all those words down to the essentials in this easy-to-read pocket guide measuring roughly (no pun intended) 4-by-5 inches. 368 pages with color map grids in back.
(ISBN 1-85828-579-8)
“Final Destinations: A Travel Guide for Remarkable Cemeteries”
(University of North Texas Press, $18.95)
Lots of graves here — voodoo queen Marie Laveau; Ham, the first chimp in space; Apache Chief Geronimo; Bill Clinton’s mother, Virginia Clinton Kelley; Jack Webb, the trick roper, not the “Dragnet” guy; and many others — in this guide that covers Texas, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Louisiana.
(ISBN 1-57441-085-7)
