Rating: 
Summary: Interesting, but Jumbled
Review: Interesting facts throughout, however, the book jumps all over the map (so to speak) and back and forth through history. It was difficult to follow the train of thought sometimes. He also puts forth an idea of pictures instead of place names about half way through the book, then proceeds to talk about it sparingly in the chapter. Interesting facts, but not well organized.
Rating: 
Summary: Very informative.
Review: Packed with facts. A great book!
Rating: 
Summary: Writing this book was both fun and enlightening.
Review: Since I grew up in Japan, I knew that Americans don't always call other countries by their own names. We say Japan, they say Nippon. But until I started researching this book, I didn't know why -- and I had no idea of the number of countries whose real names sound foreign to speakers of English. Suomi, Sverige, Misr -- all countries whose names you would quickly recognize in the oddly translated versions that we are used to. Luckily for me as an author, the answer to why we don't use the "real" names is complex and entertaining enough to warrant a book. Here are a few hints: many explorers didn't care what the native people called their own lands, and conquerors often wanted to impose a different name on purpose to show ownership. Toss in centuries worth of misspelling, misunderstanding, and faulty translation, and you begin to get an idea. I talked to and corresponded with nearly 100 people in other countries during my research, and the experience re-drew my mental map of a world that I thought was familiar.
Rating:
Summary: If a book was ever interesting about geography. . .
Review: This book has a lot of interesting facts! One of the amazing things about this book is you don't have to be a geographer or anything like that to undertand and appreciate the work done. The light humor keeps the reader in a good state of mind as he learns more about places around the world.
Rating:
Summary: Informative
Review: This book is indeed handy as a reference and uses humor as an oasis for the facts. Very interesting reading.
Rating: 
Summary: A manual of inaccuracies
Review: This seems to be a hastily written book, which may be described as a real "manual of inaccuracies". To cite only a few (I spotted dozens of them): "the Basque Provinces of Asturias, Galicia, Catalonia and Valencia" (no comments! ); "Chili does mean hot pepper in Spanish" (chilli is a nahua word, spelled in Spanish "chile"); "The Quichua language was spoken by Indians in western Guatemala..." (actually, the Quiché language, while Quechua - and not Quichua - is the language spoken in the Andean region); "New York appears as Nueva York on a Brazilian world map" (this is the Spanish name for NY, not the Portuguese Nova York). This book is not more than a shameless attempt to make money.
Rating:
Summary: A manual of inaccuracies
Review: This seems to be a hastily written book, which may be described as a real "manual of inaccuracies". To cite only a few (I spotted dozens of them): "the Basque Provinces of Asturias, Galicia, Catalonia and Valencia" (no comments! ); "Chili does mean hot pepper in Spanish" (chilli is a nahua word, spelled in Spanish "chile"); "The Quichua language was spoken by Indians in western Guatemala..." (actually, the Quiché language, while Quechua - and not Quichua - is the language spoken in the Andean region); "New York appears as Nueva York on a Brazilian world map" (this is the Spanish name for NY, not the Portuguese Nova York). This book is not more than a shameless attempt to make money.
Rating:
Summary: This book would be OK if it didn't have so many errors
Review: What is this? To call the Italian navigator Giovanni Cabotto (John Cabot, for English speakers) an "English explorer"? To seriously propose that the name of the Republic of Chile is somehow related to a Native Mexican word for "pepper"? To confuse the Quechuan language of the Andes with the Quiché peoples of Guatemala? To actually wonder whether the name of the Indonesian island of Java is somehow related to coffee? Laughable assertions such as these are found throughout "Off the Map". This book demerits its purpose, which should be to promote knowledge.
Rating:
Summary: CURIOSITIES
Review: While this is not a book with detailed account of included facts it surely deserves appreciation for its curiosity-satisfaction factor and rarity of its kind.The book jumps from subject to subject helping to present more facts which seems to be the objective of its author. It boils with facts and information that one could not find easily elsewhere and this is the joy in it. I enjoyed it and strongly recommend to others.
|
