From Library Journal
Rome, Padua & Assisi is a useful pilgrimage guide for the Jubilee Year 2000 and would serve as a good starting point for mapping out city tours. It offers a helpful historical and cultural background to each of the three cities (the most thorough is the chapter on Rome that runs well over 60 pages). As the authors discuss each city, they not only point out the sites of particular interest to visitors but also provide a list of hotels and eateries, an inventory of Jubilee 2000 events for each city, and a survivor's guide for getting around. In addition, the authors suggest other Italian destinations worth visiting. Although the descriptions of city sites are not adequately detailed, they are well ordered and clearly presented. In City Secrets: Rome, a number of architects, artists, writers, archaeologists, and historians at the prestigious American Academy in Rome write of their favorite spots in the city. Reading this book is like attending a reception at the academy and listening to academy residents offer glowing accounts of some of Rome's many treasures. Although rather small in size, it could serve as a delightful vade-mecum for tourists in Rome and provide them with an artful insight into Rome's familiar or not-so-familiar attractions. Both guides are recommended for libraries with some demand for travel books.
-David I. Fulton, Our Lady of Victories Church, Baptistown, NJ Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Review
New York architect Robert Kahn knows everybody, so when Gwyneth Paltrow asked him what she should see in Rome (while she was there filming The Talented Mr. Ripley), he collected travel tips from his artist, writer, and historian friends. Realizing that "everybody should have access to these invaluable opinions," Kahn, a onetime resident of the Italian Capitol, decided to publish City Secrets: Rome, a collection of tips, comments, and mini-essays, mainly about art and architecture, whose 200-plus contributors include restaurateur Danny Meyer, painter Frank Stella, architect Michael Graves, and playwright John Guare. His favorite secret? "A Clerical Shopping Spree," by art historian R.J.W. Cro (page 105), which describes the store where Kahn likes to stock up on the distinctive fuchsia sock favored by Catholic cardinals. The elegant, pocket-size book, published by the Little Bookroom, goes on sale in March. Next up? City Secrets: New York. --
New York MagazineNow when you travel to Rome to marvel at all of the recently restored monuments, artworks and architecture, you can follow the recommendations of some of the world's preeminent artists, historians and architects. City Secrets; Rome (The Little Bookroom) is a new, compact and sophisticated guidebook filled with eloquent musings by people with a passion for the Eternal City - including architect Richard Meier, playwright John Guare and restaurateur Danny Meyer. Whether you visit the Galleria Borghese, the Pantheon, Michelangelo's Piazza del Campidoglio, St. Peter's or the Sistine Chapel, you'll see Rome's glorious sites from very compelling-and different-perspectives. In March 2001, a City Secrets: New York City guide (with opinions from enthusiastic writers) will be available, followed by Paris and London editions. --
Town & CountryWhen in Rome, do as Danny Meyer, John Guare and Richard Meier do. With the notion that the discerning traveler wants the inside dope, Robert Kahn, a New York architect, canvassed poets, chefs, architects and others for their favorite haunts in "City Secrets Rome" (Little Bookroom). Mr. Meyer, the chef at Union Square Cafe, recommends La Taverna da Giovanni, a family trattoria near the Castel Sant'Angelo; Mr. Guare, the playwright, points the way to a relic, St. Thomas's finger at Santa Croce in Gerusalemme, and Mr. Meier, the architect, is awed by Borromini's all-white star-shaped interiors for Sant'Ivo alla Sapienza. This idiosyncratic guide helps jaded visitors see the Eternal City anew. --
The New York Times
