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Rating: 
Summary: As always, the Insight Guides bring the experience
Review: As a Insight Guide fan I feel this is a great visual guide to Japan. You can buy much better detailed traditional-style guide books with more information, but Insight Guides arent about that imho, they aim to bring the living experience of a country or an area to you via images. Content is lightweight as with most IGs. If you can afford it buy the Lonely Planet Japan for sheer information plus this book for the experience and you cant go wrong when visiting Japan.
Rating:
Summary: As always, the Insight Guides bring the experience
Review: I feel like this book was made for the average traveler with heaps of money to spend. Not many cheap options. Plus there was no coverage of off the beaten track places. Only the main cities and sights. The pictures were quite lovely, though...My advice: If a trip to Japan is in your future, pick up Lonley Planet's Japan. And if your Japanese is non-existant, I hear that LP also publishes a good phrasebook. If you have heaps of money to spend and are the type of person who likes organized tours and planned itenaries, buy this book. If not, skip it.
Rating: 
Summary: nice pictures, but really made for the typical american
Review: I feel like this book was made for the average traveler with heaps of money to spend. Not many cheap options. Plus there was no coverage of off the beaten track places. Only the main cities and sights. The pictures were quite lovely, though... My advice: If a trip to Japan is in your future, pick up Lonley Planet's Japan. And if your Japanese is non-existant, I hear that LP also publishes a good phrasebook. If you have heaps of money to spend and are the type of person who likes organized tours and planned itenaries, buy this book. If not, skip it.
Rating: 
Summary: Great pictures and stories but highly culture-opinionated
Review: I picked this book up to do some research on a possible future trip to Japan. Wanted to see, with pictures and stories, what there is to see. This book is great for that, but I keep getting distracted by the sometimes highly-opinionated (albeit fascinating) views on Japanese culture and life. Wasn't expecting such editing from a general guidebook not advertised for its opinions. Without these distractions, I'd give the book 5 stars as an advance-research book. If I had been Japanese, I might have returned it long ago (and every time I read another section, the thought still occurs to me). Can't say much more than this since I haven't been to Japan myself and haven't finished the whole book yet.
Rating:
Summary: Beautiful pictures - but hardly useful when travelling
Review: It is very good as a coffee-table book: publishers pull all the stops with beautiful, expensive, high quality photographs. There are loads of good cultural and background information, and these articles also read well (unlike writings of some supposedly insightful books like Rough Guide which are terminally, heart-stoppingly, mind-numbingly BORING). However, the guide is thin on practicalities, and all this premium quality glossy super-paper is too heavy to carry around. It is a pleasure to leaf through at home, though.
Rating: 
Summary: best guide for Japan
Review: This is the best overview guide to Japan I have seen. Not necessarily your best bet as a travel guide if you need detailed lodging info and such, but this book has beautiful pictures and great text to introduce you to the country.
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