I've been a fan of Bob Sehlinger, the author, ever since I first discovered his other book,
The Unofficial Guide Walt Disney World 2009 (Unofficial Guides). Since I was planning a trip to Las Vegas, I decided to buy this guidebook even though I'd been to the city many times before. Partly I was curious to see if this would live up to his WDW book, and partly because I wanted input on planning which shows to see, which restaurants to visit, etc. I've broken my comments on each major section of the book into separate paragraphs below.
Hotels: This section is kind of an odd grab bag of information. The author has an extensive list of covered hotels and offers a write-up of each one. Yet the information covered is often more of a general description than a true critique that would help the average traveler. For example, the Wynn Las Vegas receives three full pages of text but in all of that, there is virtually nothing said about the rooms. When reading these entries, it's more similar to how a novelist would set a scene than how I would expect a travel writer to critique a hotel. There is a chart that shows an overall rating for the hotel as well as a room rating, but no details are offered.
Restaurants: There are far too many restaurants in Las Vegas for any guide to review them all in depth but the author does a good job of breaking down your options at the major hotels. Beginning with summarized lists that show favorites by category, coverage then shifts to more detailed write-ups for each location in alphabetical order. Each restaurant receives ratings for quality, value, and an overall score. In addition, there are helpful comments. This section is very helpful.
Entertainment: There is a chart that ranks all shows in order of entertainment value followed by detailed write-ups of each show with ratings broken down by age group. This is by far the best coverage of shows that I've seen in any of the Las Vegas guides. Given the cost of tickets to these extravaganzas, this section alone is worth the price of the book as it can steer you to a great experience or help you avoid a less worthy show that you might have been considering.
Nightclubs: This section is not as comprehensive as those listed above, but it is still quite good. There are no ratings, but there are detailed reviews and tips for each of the major clubs. I don't spend a lot of time on this because I'm not a clubber, but this is at least as much coverage, and probably more, as I've seen in the other guides.
Gambling: This is the only Las Vegas guidebook that I have seen with a whole section devoted to teaching the basics of gambling. I'm not sure how seriously to take the advice since I definitely feel they overstate the difficulty of playing blackjack. Overall, it's nice that they included this, but it's no substitute for a good book on the subject.
Other: The Unofficial Guide does a decent job of covering all the miscellaneous bases. Attractions such as the Star Trek Experience at the Las Vegas Hilton get solid reviews that will help you decide whether it's your cup of tea or not. The Liberace Museum, however, is almost buried in the back with a single paragraph of coverage. All in all, I would say that these items are covered better in the Frommer's guide and if they are a big priority to you, it will be something of a black mark against this book.
Overall, it's easy for me to recommend this book. I spent quite a bit of time going through
Frommer's Las Vegas 2009 (Frommer's Complete) and
Fodor's Las Vegas 2009 (Fodor's Gold Guides) and this is much more comprehensive. It does have some weaknesses, however, and they are worth considering. The worst flaw is the nature of the hotel coverage. While a good many pages are devoted to it, detail on rooms gets short shrift. Still, this is Las Vegas and people generally don't come here to spend a lot of time inside their rooms so maybe you really do care more about the casino, lobby, etc. on which a lot of the author's prose focuses. A more minor quibble is the coverage of miscellaneous attractions but this is still pretty solid for the most part. If The Unofficial Guide to Las Vegas isn't quite up to the level of the author's Walt Disney World guide, that's not really a crime. The key is how well it stacks up to other Vegas guides and the answer is very well indeed. I give it four stars and a strong recommendation. I'll hold the fifth star for the edition where hotel coverage is strengthened a notch.
