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Rating: 
Summary: Great Guidebooks only get batter...
Review: I have been traveling to Europe several times per year for the last 7yrs and I have always found the Let's Go books to be very helpful and have one important quality that most other lack.. honesty and a true sense of the place being described. If you have to have the best in food and lodging these books are NOT for you and there are numerous others that fit the bill.
I have to respond to another review that gave a poor rating to the guide for actions of an employee of a hostel. Tell me what guidebook reviews any hostel or restaurant and then interviews each of the 20-40 employees for any unjust beliefs of another group. My U.S. military friends would top that list. What does a cop know of the Let's Go series, now there is an expert in travel. We should do without travel writers and just consult the highly cultured and well traveded local officer for any travel advice. How many cops have stayed and the pensions and hostels in their city. It is obvious that this reader has not traveled much and is part of the American problem that travels without understanding how the American attitude has painted a dark picture of aggression throughout much of the world.
As GUIDEBOOKS go these rate at or near the top and are unmatched at their intended audience.
Rating:
Summary: Grazie Let's Go!
Review: I must disagree with the man from D.C. I think this guide is fantastic. I used it when I traveled around southern Italy in March. From Rome to Pompeii to Ischia to Sicily and the Aeolian Islands Let's Go 1999: Italy helped me with all my travel needs. I especially enjoyed using the Italian phrases in the Appendix. I would never hesitate recommending any Let's Go books. I have also used Greece and USA successfully.
Rating: 
Summary: Understanding Italy
Review: I want to side with the others that gave this book a big thumbs up! Let's Go! provides sufficient information for a traveler. The only thing that you need to keep in mind is when you are traveling in Italy, things change often. Don't get disappointed, charge on, have fun because you never know when you'll return. Let's Go! offers enough inside information to get you to specific areas. The fault is yes, some information is incorrect (like schedules, numbers, etc. this is purposefull sometimes) especially since I visited most of those places and knew it as something different. My only suggestion to Let's Go! is to offer a little more info about smaller villages, especially in the Italian Alps and near the Riviera.
Rating:
Summary: The perfect book for the entry level italian traveler
Review: If this is your first visit to Italy or your first visit to one of the many 'regions' of Italy(Venice, Napoli, Firenze etc...) this is the perfect book. With separate maps of most Italian towns and easy to read legends showing the locations of train stations, bus stops and cheaper-then-average hotels/hostels you will have no problem navigating the otherwise precipitous Italian landscape. The focus of most 'Lets Go' books is the lower end hotels so if you're looking for four star elegance you may be slightly dismayed. Nevertheless this volume has excellent introductions to Italian history, culture, food and geography...A very helpful guide to Italy, this is slightly superior to the similar 'lonely planet' travel guide. Its sections on Venice, Naples and Palermo are essential to navigating those harder then average cities. Seth J Frantzman 2003
Rating:
Summary: The perfect book for the entry level italian traveler
Review: If this is your first visit to Italy or your first visit to one of the many `regions' of Italy(Venice, Napoli, Firenze etc...) this is the perfect book. With separate maps of most Italian towns and easy to read legends showing the locations of train stations, bus stops and cheaper-then-average hotels/hostels you will have no problem navigating the otherwise precipitous Italian landscape. The focus of most `Lets Go' books is the lower end hotels so if you're looking for four star elegance you may be slightly dismayed. Nevertheless this volume has excellent introductions to Italian history, culture, food and geography... A very helpful guide to Italy, this is slightly superior to the similar `lonely planet' travel guide. Its sections on Venice, Naples and Palermo are essential to navigating those harder then average cities. Seth J Frantzman 2003
Rating:
Summary: A Gorgeous Trip
Review: In Italy, this book was the bible!. I went to Rome and Spoleto and due to the book ,I avoided some nasty situations. The book enabled me to purchase bus and train passes from Acotral. Even the dispatcher asked me in halting english,"How did you know to come here? No Americans come here".The room at the Pensioni Citta was great and the low prices coupled with the outstanding service made the listing in Let's Go Italy invaluable.The pool in EUR Marconi was fantastic, and finding the FINA Office (for Waterpolo)on Via Viglio 8 helped me to practice with the National Water Polo Team.When I went back to Italy as a member of the US Karate National Team, I loaned the book to one of my teammates who wanted to stay longer. She loved the book! This book is the guide for the tourists of the World.
Rating: 
Summary: Buyer beware...
Review: Let's Go books are recognized as the definitive guides to budget/student travel, and are written and edited by students, not always with the most accuracy. The general information is usually correct, but my travelling companion and I found that a good amount of the other information (about services, schedules, phone numbers, and locations of shops, etc.) in the books tends to be out of date. When I used Let's Go Italy to find a foreign-language bookstore in Venice, for example, I found that the one listed in the guide had been closed for years. If you're really worried about your budget, you'd be better off with an International Hostelling membership and a Lonely Planet guide.
Rating: 
Summary: Dangerous trip thanks to Let's Go.
Review: My (military) boyfriend and I (Italian student... book was my idea) stayed at a Milanese hotel suggested by this AWFUL guidebook.
The place was lousy, run down and more expensive than stated on the book.
While in the restroom, I overheard a conversation during which the receptionist told someone to watch us and follow us because my guy was in the U.S. Military.
We packed our bags in one minute and ran to the police, where an inspector of the Special Ops unit warmly recommended us to stear clear from the hotels suggested by Let's Go, as they often turn out to be bad surprises!
Follow the cop's wise suggestion and get a better, more serious book!!!
Rating: 
Summary: Miserable trip in Italy thanks to Let's Go
Review: Usually I'm a big fan of Let's Go, but in this case, I have to say that their Italy guide was awful. They were misleading about the distances from stations to hostels. You'd think it wasn't far to walk but these places were often a long 2 or 3 km walk. The maps of Rome were simply inadequate and I spent so much time finding my way around Rome. Everytime I'd step into a new city, I was always disregarding Let's Go's orientations of the cities because it made no sense. Places to eat and so forth were based on which neighborhood they werre located in, and so the lack of clear neighborhood locators or lines in the maps to illustrate where neighborhoods were located really confused me. For Italy I would seriously recommend the Insight guides. Nice glossy pictures so you can see where you are and a nice, hefty indexed map of cities in the back. Don't make the same mistake I made with Let's Go Italy.
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