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Discover The Best of New York
City
Content from Frommer's New York City 2010 We all have our
personal tastes: what we like to listen to in terms of music, what
kind of food we enjoy, what we relate to in art and architecture.
Personal taste is a subjective matter, and I (Brian) only pay
attention to raves, whether they are for a restaurant, artist,
musician, or film, if they are universal. If everyone likes it, it
has to be good. Well, not always. Anyway, we’ve (Brian Silverman,
Kelsy Chauvin and Richard Goodman) compiled our personal favorites
below…for what we can call the “best of” in many areas from
experiences to restaurants. You may not agree, but that’s what
makes these “best of” lists fun. Just don’t take them too
seriously.
New York City's Top Destinations by
Category
 The Most Unforgettable New York Experiences |
 The Best Events and Seasons |
 The Best Museums |
 The Best Places to Take the Kids |
 The Best Bites for All Appetites |
 The Best Shopping |
Quintessential Guide to the Big AppleReviewed by Sacramento Book Review, 2010-02-28
As always, Frommer's doesn't disappoint. // New York City 2010// is
the quintessential guide for anyone even thinking of travelling to
the Big Apple this year. It couldn't be easier to navigate a trip
with this sleek, full-color, five-inch by eight-inch guide,
complete with a pull-out map. While all the basics are covered,
such as where to eat, sleep and shop, Frommer's takes it to another
level. Everyone's gotta eat, but Frommer's will give you the dish
on N.Y's best bagels, where to find your //burger bliss// and the
surge of new restaurants sprouting in Brooklyn, not to mention a
list of unforgettable dining experiences. In the //Best of the Big
Apple// section, writers break down the best day in New York's
other boroughs, the best neighborhoods for strolling, the best
incentives for hotel-hopping and more. If you only have one, two or
three days to spend in the city, the guidebook makes maximizing
your itinerary a no-brainer. There is even an //essential New York
eating itinerary// for the foodie. With hundreds of other covered
topics, Frommer's //New York City 2010// is as invaluable as
travelers checks.
Reviewed by Elizabeth Kalfsbeek
Frommer's: Well Worth the PriceReviewed by Kathleen Brothers, 2010-02-17
Frommer's travel guides contain hundreds of color photos, foldout
maps, exact prices, directions, and candid reviews of hotels and
restaurants, shopping, and nightlife. The guide also contains
itineraries, walking tours, trip planning ideas, insider tips from
local experts, and many other beneficial tips to get the most out
of the location someone is traveling to. Frommer's has an easy to
read structure that allows for efficient traveling and smooth
navigating, and while it may sometimes be an overload of
information, overall, it's well worth the price and will enable the
traveler to have an excellent experience in an unfamiliar
location.
In the Frommer's guide to New York City, there was a list on page
two entitled "Most Unforgettable New York City Experiences," which
was a very eye-catching way to start off the guide. Moral of the
story; Frommer's doesn't waste any time. Right away they list some
great things for first time visitors to partake in, including some
smaller things that other guidebooks might miss, like "Take the New
York City Subway." That's a no brainer to someone who's been to New
York City once or twice. It's something everyone should do, yet
something most guides might forget about. The guide also suggests
to walk up 125th street (Harlem Boulevard), and run around the
Central Park reservoir. (Two other admirable suggestions.) Then of
course, the guide lists some of the big, more obvious guns, like
visiting the Statue of Liberty and Empire State Building. Frommer's
Paris will undoubtedly inspire someone to want to visit Paris. In
the "Most Unforgettable Paris Experiences" section there are
references to Ernest Hemingway's memoir of Paris "A Moveable
Feast," and it has a list of a few bars and cafes he enjoyed
writing and drinking at, which is something many travelers, not
tourists, would be interested in visiting.
A review on the website [..] states that Frommer's guides
specialize in European countries. The travel guides taking place in
these countries are said to be of higher quality, although not much
of a difference in quality could be noticed between New York City
and the Paris guide. Both seemed quite similar in structure and
style. Granted, they were edited by different people. Perhaps in
the past it came down to how well the editors really knew the area
in which they were studying.
The guidebook contains very useful pictures on almost every page,
along with list after very useful list, including best buildings,
restaurants, and things to do for free. Numerous maps are scattered
throughout the book, and tucked away in the back is a fold out map
of Manhattan. Granted, "New York City" consists of all five
boroughs, and Manhattan is simply "The City," but that's something
to be forgiven. Someone traveling to New York wouldn't find too
much worth outside of Manhattan. It isn't a subway map, but those
are all over the city, so it would have been unnecessary. The
language of the guide is very simple. For the most part, short,
concise sentences are used. For example, on page 90, referring to
Union Square, the guide states that "Union Square is the hub of the
entire area; the N, Q, R, 4, 5, 6, W, and L train stop here, making
it easy to reach from most other city neighborhoods." Within this
short introduction to Union Square, a lot is said in simple words;
the reader knows of all the trains that run through the square, and
the area is defined as a busy, popular place with a lot of activity
going on. This use of simple language enables teenagers, as well as
older folks, to use this guide with relative ease. The language, as
well as the easy-to-use lists and references, is why Frommer's is
one of the most popular and bestselling travel guides in the world.
One downside is that Frommer's may be more geared for high rollers
in the economy department. Although Frommer's does do their best to
offer cheap and free things to do, the guide doesn't go too far out
of their way to do it, and there are plenty more expensive hotels
mentioned than cheap ones. The guide itself runs for about twenty
dollars. The smaller sized Boston edition breaks down Hotels into
three categories; very expensive, expensive, and moderate. Notice
how there is no "Cheap" section. There's always a few cheap hotels
to be mentioned, so why not include them? A few teenagers venturing
to Boston would most definitely want a cheap hotel that they could
just crash in for a few hours each night. Other lists, such as
restaurants and bars contain lists labeled as "Inexpensive."
The regular sized Frommer's travel guides for New York City and
Paris made very good use of pictures. More than half of the pages
in the guide had at least one picture. When discussing
architecture, restaurants, or even fun activities, there was
usually at least one picture to give the reader an idea of what
they were in store for. This creates a picture in the mind of the
reader, and the mere aesthetics of the visuals could be enough to
draw the reader to want to commit to either buying the book, or
listening to the writers advice. The portable Boston guide didn't
have any pictures at all, and it definitely was harder to navigate
because of it. The pictures help structure and help the reader find
things a lot quicker. If the reader wants to find a good restaurant
and they see a picture of a restaurant, chances are they've found
their section without having to look in the index.
The size of the travel guide is manageable, and reasonably
lightweight (weighing just under two pounds). It won't fit in a
normal-sized pocket, but a bag or a purse will do, and the weight
allows one to carry it around with relative ease. An older crowd
would find this The audience may be written for more of an older
crowd. It isn't overwhelmingly written for an older crowd, but if
there was any lean, it'd be more towards the older crowd. Frommer's
has a variety of locations to choose from, including, but not
limited to; Amsterdam, Barcelona, Beijing, Rome, Chicago, Dublin,
London, Las Vegas, and Hong Kong. Typically, Frommer's gears its
guides towards specific cities as oppose to generalizing them
towards countries, as some other guides occasionally do. The guide
is riddled with many interesting sections that the reader would
love, including ones such as "Where the Editor eats," which is a
list of restaurants that the editor personally writes about and
recommends.
There are a few places that Frommer's doesn't seem to cover, such
as Australia, Alaska, and other often overlooked locations if
someone wants to do some sightseeing or hiking and camping. The
purpose of the guide focuses on the overall experience of a city.
Frommer's answers the question of how a tourist can get the best
overall experience. For Frommer's, this seems to be the main
objective; experiencing a city or country as much as possible as
fast as possible, and that's something to be admired, because the
organization of the guide allows for an easy sense of navigation
and direction throughout the destination in order to get as many of
these things done as possible.
Good, Updated Travel InfoReviewed by kdea473, 2010-02-17
This 2010 version of Frommer's NYC guide joins a half dozen other
NYC guidebooks I have purchased over the past 5 or so years. I make
the 90-minute train ride into the city several times a year, always
making an effort to see and do "something new" on every trip. I do
pretty well, but am always looking for something new in the
guidebooks that I hadn't found before.
I like this book, as it has a lot of good, detailed information.
The full-color pictures are nice, and don't take up entire pages
(which I appreciate). I especially enjoy Chapter 4: Neighborhoods
& Suggested Itineraries, as there is never enough time to cover
everything in the city, and staying in one specific area allows me
more time to explore.
The book is hefty, weighing in at nearly 22 ounces. Unfortunately,
this means it gets left at home (or in a hotel room) rather than
being carried around in my bag/purse all day. For Amazon's
not-so-hefty price, though, it is certainly a welcome trip planning
tool.
High quality guideReviewed by Nicolas Leobold, 2010-01-31
Recommended. Frommer's does good city guides for major cities, but I wish they would do one for lesser-visited important cities like Seoul.
Informative and Useful, but a bit heavyReviewed by Book Fan, 2010-01-28
I haven't had the pleasure of using this guide book in NYC, but it
looks very good to the arm chair traveler. I like that it has a
neighborhood focus. There are many listings but I can only imagine
that for a place the size of NY, lots of things are missing. But it
seems to give good guidance for finding things to visit and places
not to be missed given the constraints of interest and time. The
maps seem quite readable and useful as well. Being in color is nice
and gives a richer image of the city. I hope to visit soon and I
don't plan to look for another guidebook besides this one.
My one complaint is that it is a heavy little book. I wish they had
printed it on lighter-weight paper, so that it doesn't weigh down
the traveler as much. (When my daughter was going to NY, she
refused to take it with her.) I know the color photos would not be
as nice on lighter-weight paper, but if that tradeoff lets the book
be more useful, then it would be worth it.
