Paris

The authors are well known travel writers who have published over twenty-seven books, and have updated numerous guidebooks for publishers such as Fodor's and Michelin.
In addition, they have authored over 1500 newspaper and magazine articles.

What is unique about this particular guidebook is that it places more emphasis on the adventure aspect, rather than the mundane listing of hotels, restaurants, and the other common guidebook material, although, there are ample references to the latter.

When I queried the authors as to why they had taken this approach they indicated that "the adventure aspect is one aspect that each island shares: good opportunities for adventure, whether visitors define that as scuba diving, hiking, snorkelling, or bird watching."

The organization of the book divides itself into five principal well-written chapters.
The introduction contains an abundance of useful and well-researched data concerning the history, geography, climate, flora and fauna, animal life, bird life, marine life, government, economy, and people and culture of the Cayman Islands.

The second chapter, entitled "Where are the Adventures," exposes the reader as to what is available on foot, in the water, on the water, in the air, on wheels, on horseback, eco-travel, cultural excursions, family adventures and packing for adventure.

The authors also have also included "Adventure Talks," where they interview various experts concerning such topics as diving in the Cayman Islands, eco-travel tours, and snorkelling adventures.

The remaining three chapters concern themselves with the 3 Islands, Grand Cayman, Cayman Brac, and Little Cayman. Within these chapters there are important tips as to how to get around, sights and attractions, accommodations, restaurants, sightseeing, shopping, nightlife, and beaches.
The authors' brisk, informative, and well-written text makes for an easy to read guide.

As an added feature, the guidebook contains a sprinkling of a few well-chosen photo images, some in color, and others in black and white.
There are also a few simple maps inserted into the text along with the photo images.
The end of the book includes useful web sites, a short bibliography and a helpful index.

Whether you are a first time visitor to the Cayman Islands, or a traveler, who has visited before, you will garner precious and valuable information upon reading this well organized guidebook.

Highly recommended.

[...]

Two things, however, frustrated me deeply. The listing for each attraction listed the metro stop, but didn't tell you what metro line that stop was on. This lead to me standing in metro stations staring at my English guidebook, trying to find one stop among 100 without any information as to where it might be. AARRGH! Also, the book recommends booking hotels through the frommers.com web site; but most of the hotels in the book are not on the web site and vice-versa. This makes it difficult to make a booking when you aren't sure what you're looking for.

Overall, I'd recommend this book to a traveller, but perhaps not as a sole resource.

As in real life, keeping a thriving business profitable after suffering such a catastrophe of the founding "mother's" death, the author manages to weave a plot of secret relationships, intrigue and insecurity that keeps the reader more than interested in the outcome.

As with Emmas other works the author continues to surprise by bringing up new pictorals of real world erotica that are interspersed in the novel exactly where and when they should be. Simply delicious.

The scene and description in the back seat of a taxi ride home between Philip and Beatrix was so real that the reader actually feels that they are vicariously part of the sizzling action .. Yummie yummie ...

I loved this book on two levels: sheer entertainment, and political history.

On the entertainment side, I somehow can't get enough of "abuse of power" stories and their wretched central characters. Crewdson is the first to unequivocally and clearly document the most egregrious example on record in our most hallowed halls, those of science. Watch (and wonder) as the supposedly magisterial and wise drop everything but the thinnest pretense of honorable, rational behavior in a lust for fame, status, and patent annuities. It is a great white collar crime story, aided and abetted by many of Gallo's government loyalists, all of whom share the blame.

On the political history side, Crewdson has exposed the modern myth of the infallible scientist, a kind of Macbeth of microbiology whose need for power threw his community into disarray. Although Crewdson doesn't say so, an interesting result may have been this: twenty years ago scientists were reported as baffled by AIDS, and today they are reported as still baffled (just scan over the "AIDS at 20" area of The New York Times Web site). Now take Crewdson's ghastly tale - never before fully told - and sandwich it in. You finish wondering if the entire course of AIDS research wasn't derailed from the beginning by Gallo's behavior and "gold rush" mentality.

The bonus for the reader is that buying this book is like voting for a free press. Crewdson is the rare journalist whose own sweat and sacrifice is evident on every page, and without whose kind we could hope for little truth where it matters most.

If I had not known Mary Blume wrote her Paris beat pieces for the International Herald Tribune, I would have thought they were written for The New Yorker magazine. She wrote tongue-in-cheek stories that begin in the middle and assume the reader already knows a great deal about Paris life. If she pops up in London you don't blink an eyelash because you know it's a day trip to travel from London to Paris, or Paris to anywhere else for that matter since Paris has made itself the travel hub of Europe.

I read these articles over lunch--spread over a few months. I carried the book in my book bag and broke it out when I needed a little light reading. This is a perfect book for travel because if you put it away and don't look at it for a month you won't loose your train of thought. If you read it straight through it may be as disappointing as reading a week of newspapers.

The book title would lead you to believe that the book is about France, some of the stories take place in other countries and I could not figure out how they ended up in the book. Additionally the last section of the book focuses on a group of European filmmakers that would have worked well as a Filmography, but for my money did not belong in a book of this title.

Don't get me wrong, there are some interesting and well-written pieces in this book, but you have to trundle through pages that I feel are slow and dated to get to them. If you have not read much about France, I recommend Adam Gopnick's "Paris to The Moon," John Littell's "French Impressions," or for a humorous perspective any of Peter Mayle's "Provence" works. Of course, don't miss the grandfather of all books on France, Hemmingway's "A Moveable Feast."