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Travel Reference, Essays and Individual Humorists, Travel and Transportation - Humor, Travel - General & Miscellaneous
Dave Barry's Only Travel Guide You'll Ever Need by Dave Barry β€” book cover

Dave Barry's Only Travel Guide You'll Ever Need

by Dave Barry
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Overview

TAKE YOUR TRAVEL TIPS FROM DAVE BARRY,
A GUY WHO IS REALLY GONE!

Complete with maps, histories, quaint local facts (France's National Underwear Changing Day is March 12), song lyrics, helpful hints on how to get through Customs (all insects must be spayed), and tidbits from Dave Barry's own fond vacation nightmares, DAVE BARRY'S ONLY TRAVEL GUIDE YOU'LL EVER NEED is just that. You'll find everything you need to know in this incredibly comprehensive reference, including:

- Air Travel (Or: Why Birds Never Look Truly Relaxed)
- Traveling as a Family (Or: No, We Are NOT There Yet)
- Traveling in Europe ("Excuse me! Where is the Big Mona Lisa?")
- Camping: Nature's Way of Promoting the Motel Industry

It took no time at all for Barry's travel guide to travel onto hardcover bestseller lists. Traveling into trade paperback, it's just in time to make a connection with the new hardcover, Dave Barry Does Japan. From the backroads of America to seeing the exotic sights of Europe, everything from air travel to camping is covered in this hilarious outing by the Pulitzer Prize-winning humorist.

Synopsis

TAKE YOUR TRAVEL TIPS FROM DAVE BARRY,
A GUY WHO IS REALLY GONE!

Complete with maps, histories, quaint local facts (France's National Underwear Changing Day is March 12), song lyrics, helpful hints on how to get through Customs (all insects must be spayed), and tidbits from Dave Barry's own fond vacation nightmares, DAVE BARRY'S ONLY TRAVEL GUIDE YOU'LL EVER NEED is just that. You'll find everything you need to know in this incredibly comprehensive reference, including:

- Air Travel (Or: Why Birds Never Look Truly Relaxed)
- Traveling as a Family (Or: No, We Are NOT There Yet)
- Traveling in Europe ("Excuse me! Where is the Big Mona Lisa?")
- Camping: Nature's Way of Promoting the Motel Industry

Publishers Weekly

A distinctly minor effort by the Miami Herald columnist and author of such previous successes as Dave Barry's Greatest Hits , this guide works too hard for comic effect. There are strained references to inedible airline food, a ``Five Booger'' ranking from the ``Michelin Guide to How Snotty a Restaurant Is,'' Chicago as ``The City with a Great Big Butt.'' There are tired gags, one involving the translation of a phrase about ``the fish of your brother Raoul'' and another about using the same map for downtown Vienna, London and Berlin. But the book is not completely devoid of laughs: ``Akron: Meeting Yesterday's Challenges Tomorrow'' is cited as a typical article from an airline magazine. There is a clever parody of a highway historical marker; and a discussion of the problem of locating a tree in Oregon that doesn't have an ecologist wrapped around it. The book, however, is hardly sidesplitting. (Oct.)

About the Author, Dave Barry

A syndicated newspaper columnist whose laugh-out-loud humor has also resulted in several books, Dave Barry is an equal opportunity mocker. On subjects ranging from politics to Japan to parenting, he expertly highlights the irony and absurdity in everyday life.

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Editorials

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

A distinctly minor effort by the Miami Herald columnist and author of such previous successes as Dave Barry's Greatest Hits , this guide works too hard for comic effect. There are strained references to inedible airline food, a ``Five Booger'' ranking from the ``Michelin Guide to How Snotty a Restaurant Is,'' Chicago as ``The City with a Great Big Butt.'' There are tired gags, one involving the translation of a phrase about ``the fish of your brother Raoul'' and another about using the same map for downtown Vienna, London and Berlin. But the book is not completely devoid of laughs: ``Akron: Meeting Yesterday's Challenges Tomorrow'' is cited as a typical article from an airline magazine. There is a clever parody of a highway historical marker; and a discussion of the problem of locating a tree in Oregon that doesn't have an ecologist wrapped around it. The book, however, is hardly sidesplitting. (Oct.)

Kirkus Reviews

Holder of a Pulitzer for funny commentary, Barry (Dave Barry Slept Here, 1989) follows the footsteps of Baedeker and Marco Polo and offers a travel book that is more current and just as useful. In a time-honored and noble tradition of comical assessments of the world away from home, Barry presents a light text, augmented with the customary cheesy charts, footnotes, and diagrams. (Maybe it's just coincidence, but the handy street-maps of Cairo, London, Berlin or Munich [one map], Vienna, Paris, and downtown Ireland all appear alarmingly similar.) There's advice on planning a trip (the author differs from his wife about packing a waffle iron), foreign languages, air travel, family travel (the best time to visit Disney World: 1962), and camping. There's a guide to all fifty states, Canada, and Mexico. Then there are also foreign countries, located in Europe. (See "How to Use a Bidet.") "Most of these countries," Barry astutely points out, "eventually realized the marketing advantage of not being so foreign." Little-known foreign fact: "England manufactures most of the world's airline food." Filled with shameless fabrication (we happen to know, because we checked the road atlas we got from the insurance company, that Alaska is not in Canada, for example), but Barry's lies, like all good comedy, are emblematic of some kind of truth or other. Besides, "you can trust us," he says. "We're a guidebook." The title is accurate. Get this travel guide and you'll never want another. Funny stuff.

Book Details

Published
March 1, 1999
Publisher
Random House Publishing Group
Pages
192
Format
Mass Market Paperback
ISBN
9780345431134

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