No comments about Guide to Moscow.

No comments about Nagel Travel Guide to Moscow and Its Environs.

No comments about International Travel Maps: Moscow City.

No comments about Moscow/Leningrad.

No comments about Baedeker's Moscow (AA Baedeker's).

No comments about Moscow/Leningrad: A Guide.

5 comments about All the Clean Ones Are Married: And Other Everyday Calamities in Moscow.

1. The book isn't perfect, but it doesn't need to be. It tells about the foibles that the author ran into during her time in Moscow. Rather than attempting to explain everything, she focuses in on some things that occured and tells those stories. Her writing is very easy to read and follow, making the book fairly hard to put down. (I ended reading it over an 8 hour period, taking a lunch and Snood break in the middle.)

   I'm sure I'll re-read this book for the sheer entertainment value...




2. The book isn't perfect, but it doesn't need to be. It tells about the foibles that the author ran into during her time in Moscow. Rather than attempting to explain everything, she focuses in on some things that occured and tells those stories. Her writing is very easy to read and follow, making the book fairly hard to put down. (I ended reading it over an 8 hour period, taking a lunch and Snood break in the middle.)

   I'm sure I'll re-read this book for the sheer entertainment value...




3. I found this book at the local library and decided that it was worth the read, and it was. Lori brings to life true everyday occurances in modern-day Moscow. They are as she sees them, but a little too observatory for my tastes as I prefer to see through the eyes of my writers. Still, it was a good book and I think that any non-Russian living in Moscow can identify with its humorous, yet at the same time depressing, events of the life. (And yes, all of the clean ones ARE married).



4. Living in Russia is scary. By the end of every book I read about Russia, I am relieved that I don't live there. No matter how upbeat and positive the authors are, and they are all pretty optimistic, they come back home having had a huge dose of Russian reality.
   
   Lori Cidylo is fantastically optimistic. Even though her Ukrainian parents try to tell her that Russia is no place for her, she takes her college degrees in Russian and journalism and goes to Moscow to freelance. To freelance! She gets a job at a U.S. newpaper bureau there and begins to settle in.
   
   Nothing is easy. Finding an apartment when there are no rental listings or yellow pages is a challenge. Buying a clothes washer is a major project. Finding someone to reupholster her garish sofa is a wild goose chase. She even has to iron her dollar bills (American currency is accepted for many transactions) because no one will accept them unless they are clean and unwrinkled. And don't get her started on the problems with dating Russian men.
   
   But all that seems trivial compared to being in Moscow during the showdown between Yeltsin and his rebellious Parliament. Cidylo dodged tanks, snipers, and thugs to get her story. Everyday life in Moscow had trained her well for being a reporter in a war zone. Having survived traffic that jumped sidewalks without regard for pedestrians and hooligans who fired automatic weapons at random, Muscovites (and Cidylo) went about their business despite the revolution, because it might go on for months, after all.
   
   Cidylo's writing style is smooth and easy to read. Her training as a reporter is apparent. The prose is spare and free of unnecessary description. Five stars!



5. As a travel/non-fiction junkie, I chose this book after reading several other Russian based travel accounts, and found this to be one of the most interesting yet. Cidylo goes to great pains to make the reader feel that they are in the moment with her. I found her accounts of what it was like as a foreigner AND a woman to be particularly interesting. The only thing keeping me from giving it 5 stars was the fact that the story did drag at points. Highly recommended otherwise.

No comments about Nagel Travel Guide Series.

No comments about Live from Moscow.

No comments about Moscow Guide, 2nd Edition.