5 comments about Hungry? Los Angeles 3rd edition.

1. First, I love food, and Los Angeles is a great place to eat. So imagine the difficulty involved in picking a great little undiscovered restaurant with thousands of eateries among the hundreds of square miles of L.A. County.
   
   Enter Hungry? Los Angeles. Since the slim first edition came out about four years ago, I've used this book, kept editions in my glove box, and given them away to newbie neighbors. There are hundreds of listings covering a vast swath of the Los Angeles area.
   
   Hungry? is geared towards economical restaurants, but they are not restricted to "cheap eats" places. There are plenty of higher-end eateries as well, but these are usually written about highlighting certain specialties or meal times. Reviewers note ambience, costs, and neighborhood info in addition to their favorite dishes. It's broken into geographic sections which encompass far north and west (to Ventura County), the east (San Gabriels), through the Westside and down to the edge of Orange County in the south. Special sections also break out the best night-owl spots, the best burgers, and many other eclectic sub-categories.
   
   Obviously I like the book so much because I agree with the reviewers in a majority of cases. Most of my favorite restaurants make it into the guide. Instant validation! Plus I find new places I haven't tried yet and make a note to visit them.
   
   This 3rd edition is not without it's minor problems; there are a lot more typoes and spelling errors in this book than in previous editions, some addressess (and indeed a few cities) are completely wrong, some of the restaurants reviewed have been closed for a few years, and I think they were late to press and rushed the book through. But these are quibbles. If you call in advance to make sure the eatery is open for business, you'll be able to count on many, many pleasant dining experiences.



2. I loved the earlier editions of this food guide when I lived in the city, but now that I'm down at the beach, the older versions just didn't cut it--so I e-mailed the editors and the listened. The new Hungry?, which I just picked up today, has a TON of listings for the beaches, south bay and Torrance area which, unfortunately, I now must frequent. This book is a total must if you live in LA--forget the other guides!



3. I love LA and I love these books. They're quirky, fun, and really really honest. I couldn't wait for the new edition to come out and was just about to eamil the publishers when I saw that this came out. Since I am (or try to be) a vegetarian, this book's the best yet because it has a huge selection of veggie friendly/vegan places. It also seems like they expanded their coverage of the beaches and westerly areas.



4. I picked up this book after the color caught my eye, and it has come in handy much more than expected! It's got some great places that I would never have found on my own. The reviews give all the info you'd need before deciding on a place to eat, and although it doesnt cover EVERY restaurant in the city like Zagat, it gives good suggestions for every neighborhood. I highly reccommend it.



5. If you live in L.A. or are going to visit this is a must have guide.

No comments about Night+Day Los Angeles (Pulse Guides Cool Cities Series).

4 comments about A Parent's Guide to Los Angeles.

1. This book provides all the basics -- sites, how to get there, prices, hours, amenities -- but it also rings true with an air of authenticity and experience. This is a real mom who went to these places with real kids and went through all the same things that everyone goes through -- standing in lines, eating good or bad concession food, trying to give the kids a fun day instead of just wearing them out. We've actually used and benefited from the info in the book and I recommend it wholeheartedly.



2. I have found this book to be totally enjoyable, humorous and was extremely helpful when we took our grandkids to visit friends and sightsee in the L.A. area. I have many friends who like to travel and I will certainly recommend this book as a real time saver while in L.A. Excellent!



3. Finally -- an all-inclusive source of information for favorite aunties (to stay that way) and god-parents too! Although I have no children, I have scads of nieces and nephews who visit from back east; plus my friends have children who sometimes like hanging out with me (and I with them). For years I have cut articles about "fun places to go" out of newspapers and magazines and stuffed them into drawers, until I have no drawers left. But no more! This fun and well-written guide has it all and is geared specifically to children and their grown-up buddies, not just vacationing families. I especially enjoy the photos taken by the author's children, which prove they really did enjoy these places. Not only do I recommend this guide to vacationing families, I also sing its praises for Southern California adults with young friends and relatives who visit often.



4. Excellent book! Author Kathie Weir describes hundreds of enriching things for parents and children to do in the greater L.A. area. As a longtime resident of southern California, the author has visited most of these sites with her children, so her descriptions include a personal and honest touch; for example, in evaluating one museum, she writes, "Most of the under-twelve set will be happier elsewhere, but if you have one of those super-brainy, bored-with-everything, and a bit off-beat teens, this museum is IT." I liked her warm, down-to-earth writing style. Most of us---who think of famous amusement parks when we think of L.A.---are not aware of the area's wealth of museums, historical sites, wildlife preserves, train rides, gardens, annual events and much more. For instance, I was surprised to learn that Southeast Los Angeles has a Civil War Museum. The Union Army was stationed on the West Coast during the Civil War, and the Officer's Quarters of Drum Barracks now serves as a museum. The book lists many other places as intriguing as this. A Parent's Guide to Los Angeles is also very well organized. The author divides Los Angeles County into four areas, lists the sites by geographical section, and includes clear driving directions to each one. In fact, she devotes a whole chapter to tips on driving in L.A., offering helpful advice about coping with freeways and rush hours. Weir most definitely understands what it's like to travel with children, which gives her book even more credibility. She writes, "Parents never know what might strike a child's fancy" and confesses that when she took her children to see the great sights of Europe, the part they talked about the most afterwards was feeding the pigeons. How true this rings for anyone who has traveled with children! "An afternoon at a playground followed by hotdogs, cooked in the park's firepit can be a cherished memory for a kid," she advises. I was impressed with her attitude that sightseeing is a valuable form of education for children, but that "every family is different and every child has his or her own interests." This book provides a wide range of choices for any family's individual needs. I highly recommend this book.

No comments about Frommer's Family Travel Guide: Los Angeles With Kids (Frommer's Family Travel Guides).

5 comments about Thomas Guide 2005 Los Angeles and Orange Counties Street Guide: Spiral Binding (Los Angeles and Orange Counties Street Guide).

1. If you live in the L.A. area or spend significant amounts of time here, you need this book. Sure, you can get free maps from yahoo, mapquest or google, but when you're heading through El Monte and the 10 is blocked up, no website is going to help you find an alternate route.
   
   It's also handy for locating a nearby post office, or most significant landmarks (the major stores at malls are identified by code, even, which helped my wife find a nearby Sears when she needed to make an exchange).
   
   My only complaint is that the included CD-ROM version of the maps is Windows-only. They're considering a Mac version, but it'll likely be a year or two before we see it.



2. I bought this product 99% for the guide as I've used previous versions in the past and have liked very much. As I've just moved to Orange county and found that the area I live in doesn't exist in prior guides (1999) I needed an upgrade. 2005 seems to have it all.
   
   Only problem, I tried installing the software from the CD on 2 of my computers running WinXP and it was a no-go. Ended up installing all these funky .dll's and then the program wouldn't even boot when executed. Bummer as I was excited to have the guide available on my computer.



3. I just spent two weeks in L.A looking for places to live. This street finder quickly found all the addresses I was looking for. And I could easily navigate from one place to another, even when crossing several cities.



4. Since I started driving many years ago, I have always had a Thomas Guide. Even with the advent of GPS technology (a bit too expensive for me now), the Thomas Guide is invaluable. The latest version of the LA-OC guide has all the latest updates, which is very important with all the new construction in the OC. My 2001 guide was getting outdated, so I bought a new one.
   
   One of the greatest features of the current guide is the CD included in the back. I installed it on my laptop, and it saves me time as I travel. When I need to go from one location to another and I don't have Internet access, I simply use the Thomas Guide CD.



5. This guide makes it so much easier, because in Los Angeles and Orange Counties, I would need numerous individual maps, instead of this single book.

2 comments about In Search of Literary L.A..

1. If you are able to wade through the author's poor writing style, there are some interesting nuggets of information within, though read cautiously; there are a great many dubious anecdotal stories for all the hard facts of Los Angeles' rarely documented literary past. Probably the best available (for now).`



2. Way back in the 1970s and '80s, the five or six practicing intellectuals in Los Angeles were morbidly embarrassed about their burg's lack of cultural history.... That all began to change with Lionel Rolfe's thesis in "In Search of Literary L.A." -- the fact that, like it or not, a sizeable number of world-class writers lived and worked in L.A., and produced some classic books there. Now it's become an obsessive pastime in L.A. for cultural recyclers to rummage around in far-flung nooks and crannies in search of historic and cultural plaudits (however questionable) to trumpet, but Rolfe was the first to even suggest that "Literary L.A." was a valid concept rather than a good title for a blank book. As such, he deserves some respect for being a prophet without honor, doing the unnecessary for the ungrateful. If those people who have just started to read are disgruntled because Rolfe left out their favorite scribbler, or would prefer a more academic writing style to "In Search of Literary L.A."'s jocular yarn-spinning, all they have to do is wait for the inevitable spate of bandwagon-jumpers to start publishing their opinions. Can "In Search of Liteary L.A.: The Movie" be far behind? END

3 comments about Chinese Food Finder: Los Angeles and the San Gabriel Valley.

1. I was very excited to get this book, since San Gabriel Valley is littered with way more Chinese restaurants than I could ever try personally. I imagine it was a tough job, especially in the fast-paced Chinese restuarant scene where stores pop up and die overnight. (And a few listings have already gone out of business.) The book succeeds at providing a good overview of the various regional cuisines, and I did enjoy reading about unfamiliar foods and their history.
   
   However, a little more detailed information about the specific restaurants and more write-ups would make this book even better. For example, there are tons of dim sum places in the Valley, but only a handful are written up and Carl was lukewarm toward all of them. Where is a great dim sum place? Maybe descriptions of how the dim sum offerings might differ from say Mission 261 and Ocean Star (both are mega banquet room sized, but Ocean Star offers far more food variety than Mission 261). The Hong Kong style coffee shop listings also felt thin, leaving out alot of the tasty and popular spots that dot Valley Blvd. like OK Cafe and U2. And how about writing up the best place for roast suckling pig or squab?
   
   Despite these shortcomings, I would still recommend this book as a solid introduction to LA Chinese cuisine.



2. well written, accurate, helpful, and there is nothing like it on the Internet or in print



3. This book is both more useful than you'd expect, and less. The lesser part is because many of the restaurants listed in the guide no longer exist. A guidebook like this one needs to be updated every couple of years for it to fulfill its purpose. There are too many restaurants listed that have since closed and too many new restaurants that should be in here that aren't, but that goes with the territory of writing restaurant guides.
   
   On the other hand, this book provides an excellent introduction to the regional cuisines of China, with detailed descriptions of the kinds of dishes to expect at various types of Chinese restaurants. This book can be a handy tool for ordering a meal at any authentic Chinese restaurant regardless of what city it's in. Even though I'm quite familiar with Chinese cuisine, I often bring this book with me for mealtime inspiration when I'm traveling to any city with a Chinatown--I even brought it with me on my most recent trip to Hong Kong & Guangdong.
   
   Reviewed by Barbara Strother, author of Moon Living Abroad in China (Living Abroad).

No comments about California Sights and Scenes of Los Angeles (California Sights and Scenes of Series.).

1 comments about Insight City Guide Los Angeles (Insight Guides).

1. For first time travellers to Los Angeles this book gave a wonderful insight into the city and helped greatly with our planning. Gave heaps of information on all aspects of the city not just on the 'Hollywood' side. Would recomend it to anyone visiting LA.

No comments about Los Angeles Complete Residents' Guide.