Customer Reviews

Frommer's 99 Paris (Serial)

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FOMMER'S PARIS '99 CONTAINS MUCH HELPFUL AND THOROUGH INFORMATION WHICH IS SIMILAR TO OTHER GUIDEBOOKS. BUT FROMMER'S INCLUDES TOPICS THAT AREN'T COVERED IN DETAIL IN OTHER BOOKS SUCH AS PERSONAL SAFETY-WHAT PLACES THAT SHOULD BE AVOIDED, WARNINGS ABOUT GYPSY PICKPOCKETS ON THE METRO, ETC. ALSO THE BOOK IS PRESENTED IN AN ORDERLY FASHION MAKING IT EASY TO FIND WHAT TOPICS YOU'RE SEARCHING FOR.

Preparing for my first trip to Paris last year, I borrowed an acquaintance's collection of maps, guides, and books on this wonderful city. The Michelin Street Map Guide (blue) and this book were the top winners. I mostly used the second half of the Frommer's Guide; the first half has a lot of information on hotels and restaurants and I just browsed through this section since I was staying at a friend's apartment that was empty for the summer. The guide gave me information on the sites to see, times and days they were open, and even the entry fees. I love history and trivia and this book is also full of that. If you want to have background information on the monuments, museums, and neighborhoods so that your visit is enriched and it all makes sense, get this book. Did you know that the Louvre was originally a medieval castle where French Kings lived on and off? Or that the Hotel des Invalides (next to the domed church that houses the tomb of Napoleon) is the finest military museum in the world? Or that the Paris catacombs were the French Resistance's headquarters during WWII? The guide also has a map of the Metro system, very handy for planning your daily itinerary. This year I had the awesome opportunity to go to Paris again so I bought my own set of books: The Frommer's Guide and the Michelin Street Map Guide, that's all. This time I used the Frommer's Guide to plan two day-trips, Versailles and Fountainbleu, and it gave me accurate information on metro stations, trains, fares, and travel time. I also used it to find nighttime spots where to mingle with locals. Overall, the Frommer's Guide is the most informative and entertaining guide on Paris there is!

I returned yesterday from a week-long trip to Paris, with Frommer's as my only guidebook. Overall, I found it very helpful. The listings of the important sites to see are very complete, and they give interesting histories of each of the important sites. Also useful is the section in the beginning which lists which sites to hit if you're on a tight schedule.

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.

I bought both Frommer's Paris and Fodor's Paris and found Frommer's sooo much better. The selection of hotels and restaurants covered a much broader price spectrum in Frommer's, and the sightseeing coverage gave me lots of information and tips. And the section of color photos really adds to the read.

For my first trip to Paris, I bought this guide and one other. This one was by far the best. I particulary benefited from the section on walking tours. The small maps inside the book depicting portions of the city were not too helpful because they didn't name a lot of the streets. However, the book came with a very good, full map of the central city, in a pull out section at the back.

This book would be fine if you didn't have a budget or don't want to be told much in the way of interesting stories in your guidebooks...I much preferred the Rick Steves Paris guidebook, which has better accomodations at better prices, while focusing on certain neighborhoods where you can mingle with the locals.
This is sort of a touristy guide that can complement the Rick Steves books in case his accomodations are booked or you want more comprehensive listings of the expensive restaurants in the city.
BTW, my wife and I left ours at home and went to Paris with the Rick Steves guidebook (which is slimmer) instead. We did rip out the useful maps, however.

This guide covers all the basic information needed for a trip to Paris, but is not as complete as the Michelin Green guide as an information resource, and not as helpful in organizing and planning your trip as Rick Steve's Paris guide. It does, however, have more hotel and restaurant information than either of the two other guides I mentioned.

FOMMER'S PARIS '99 CONTAINS MUCH HELPFUL AND THOROUGH INFORMATION WHICH IS SIMILAR TO OTHER GUIDEBOOKS. BUT FROMMER'S INCLUDES TOPICS THAT AREN'T COVERED IN DETAIL IN OTHER BOOKS SUCH AS PERSONAL SAFETY-WHAT PLACES THAT SHOULD BE AVOIDED, WARNINGS ABOUT GYPSY PICKPOCKETS ON THE METRO, ETC. ALSO THE BOOK IS PRESENTED IN AN ORDERLY FASHION MAKING IT EASY TO FIND WHAT TOPICS YOU'RE SEARCHING FOR.

if you're going to Paris, this book is must. It was so accurate.