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| ripoffDo you think you'd want to read about the Mail Boat Between New Providence and Eleuthera Islands, Bahamas? I thought not. How about a cat problem in Elmira new York, corruption in Lagos Nigeria, Bouvet Island which is 1500 miles from Capetown, South Africa? Starting to get the picture? This book is about a lot of places and things of no possible interest except that Greenburg found a clipping somewhere that he could edit slightly and insert into the book. There are a few interesting facts, of course, but not enough to justify reading this book, even if you get it for free!
A semi-random collection of reasons not to go just about everywhereGreenberg, as the cover of Don't Go There! helpfully notes, is the Travel Editor [1] for NBC's Today Show, so many of you may already have heard of him. This is his latest breezy book about traveling the world, with an emphasis on the places he expects people will want to avoid.
Don't Go There! has seventeen chapters, each of them focusing on one particular kind of unpleasantness -- they range from air pollution to political corruption, from disease and natural disasters to unsafe and unpleasant trains, roads, or airports -- and counting up the worst offenders both in the USA and around the world. Interspersed are a half-dozen shorter sections which are not numbered in sequence with the chapters, but provide very similar lists and commentary in a few other areas, such as the most expensive cities, the most depressed destinations, and the most dangerous theme parks.
Most of us are unlikely to have the hugely widely scope for world travel that would make Don't Go There! particularly useful; those of us who do regularly travel to lots of different destinations are likely to do so for work purposes, and so have less control over those destinations than leisure travelers would. But anyone who likes to travel at all knows that the armchair kind of travel is almost as much fun as the real kind -- and cheaper, too. Don't Go There! is like hearing stories of someone else's travel travails while sitting comfortably wherever you happen to be. It has a lot of charts and statistics, which are fun to look at but probably won't make anyone change their bookings.
In short, this is a fine book if you come across it something like the way I did: randomly, and read on a whim. It doesn't provide much depth, and doesn't really cross-reference the different measures of horribleness to make a grand index of places to avoid, so it reads a bit like a collection of separate essays. Still, if only a few isolated facts stick in the reader's head, that will probably be useful.
[1] This implies that some people at NBC don't know the difference between what a text editor -- of magazines or books -- and a video editor do, since Greenberg is apparently the soliciting-pieces kind of editor rather than the cutting-it-to-fit-in-a-time-slot editor. Either that, or they just don't care. My money, as always with TV folks, is on "don't care."
One of the worst travel books out thereI bought this book with high expectations looking for some good info or anecdotes. Rather it is just a cover for radical global warming hysteria and other ecological nonsense.
On top of that it is mostly a glob of statistics that really don't apply much in reality to the average traveler. Most of these places I don't believe the author has ever seen or even knows about yet he always adds the disclaimer "Don't go there!".
The self loathing and self hating attitude carries through the whole book. Essentially his point of view is that any travel adds carbon dioxide to the atmosphere and that travel to certain areas might damage them ecologically. Of course it's okay for him and his elite travel writers to go anywhere they see fit, however us "little people" should avoid going anywhere at any cost.
The only interesting part of the book was the last few pages with recommendations for places to avoid from their own ACTUAL experiences, however yet again much of it is colored with global warming hysteria.
Don't Go to the Bookstore to Buy this Book!I picked this book up from the library, hoping for some insights just in case I can ever afford a "real" vacation. Of course, being a Chicagoan, the first place I looked up was Chicago. The author warns visitors from going anywhere south of the Loop--oh, did I mention that I am a SOUTHSIDER? If a travel guide makes that recommendation, it tells me the author did not explore the Southside, and probably didn't bother doing much legwork at any of the other places. Obviously, he's never visited the U of Chicago campus (and its Hyde Park neighborhood), our little slice of the 19th Century which is Pullman, the Frank Lloyd Wright/Walter Burley Griffin homes in Beverly, or the Museum of Science and Industry. He's also never seen Chinatown, Pilsen or watched a Sox game live. (And I could take him to some really scuzzy Northside places, too.)
Most of the advice in this book is of the "Duh!" variety, like a caution about taking a Chernobyl tour. A lot of information is useless, in the sense that, if you visit ANYWHERE, you'll expose yourself to some sort of hazard (high ozone, hurricanes, packs of rabid mongrels). So you could take this book seriously and stay home in your bubble. Or, chuck the book, use common sense, and see the world!
Travel Books that make you go "hmmmm..." how objective and honest is the author really?I just read through Peter Greenberg's book in its entirety today, and at first I giggled as I thought to myself "yeah, he's gonna tick off some travel agent, hoteliers, and Chamber of Commerce booster types" but by the time I finished this book, I wasn't laughing anymore. Rather, I was just plain disgusted and annoyed. One has to seriously wonder if this guy isn't just some crumudgeon who is set out to find the negative in everything...and then self-righteously call his distorted views "truth."
That sort of thing seems to be all too common these days...and THAT's the truth *sticking out tongue ala Ernestine*
Mind you, I don't claim to be an "expert" and I'm no paid travel industry professional. I'm just a regular pink collar worker/amateur musician who enjoys travel. I go to various places either for gigs or pleasure or visit family and friends.
Please, travelers, save your money and don't buy this book. Read it in the store or at the library. In my opinion, this is the stuff that is better off in blogs rather than expecting someone to actually purchase a laundry list of complaints posing as a travelogue. Honestly, it's just a tome of relentless negativity and insults.
If Greenberg's word is taken as gospel truth, then this guy would have most people afraid to leave their own homes let alone their own town! I'd say with travel anyplace the best adage is "ones mileage may vary" and to me, telling someone to DON'T go someplace based on one's own personal biases simply isn't right or fair. Just because one person may have a negative experience in one place or circumstance (and I have had such experiences like many others), it doesn't mean that someone else will have the exact same bad thing happen to them in the same place. They may have the time of their lives...how does one know unless you do "GO THERE"?
A good travel experience isn't just about sticking only to familiar places, staying in 5 star hotels, eating gourmet meals at Michelin restaurants...or about imposing upper class US or Northern European values on the whole world. Part of being a successful traveler means being prepared, but it also means keeping an open mind, and being gracious and flexible in most circumstances, and yes, sometimes being pro-active and confronting a situation head on and making sure a problem gets remedied to your satisfaction...in other words, speaking up at the moment rather than waiting and complaining later. This is what I've tried to do ever since my very first solo vacation at age 16. Based on what I read in this book, I'd say that Mr. Greenberg doesn't strike me as having any of those qualities, despite all of his talk about his expertise.
You have to wonder....how does one know whether or not that Mr. Greenberg didn't write some of this negative stuff because he simply has an ax to grind, or as a way of getting back at someone he got mad at...perhaps one rude clerk at a hotel? For some people, it's almost a sport to go to a blog or rating/reviews website and then trash something just to extract revenge. No concern about whether that person might lose their job or their business or further damage the economy of an area due to those losses...so long as their personal pique is assuaged.
One of the main reasons why this book has put me off enough to write this review is because I sensed that there is more than hint of racism and classism in Greenberg's views. Take notice...most of the places Greenburg criticizes and outright slams are predominantly non-white locations (Detroit, Cleveland, many of the places in the Southern US et al) or areas that are primarily working class or rural.
As for that section re: suicide places...give me a break! Telling someone not to travel to a place because people have killed themselves there is just utterly ridiculous. Does he think we're all "monkey see, monkey do" or something? Sheesh! More people commit suicide in their OWN homes than traveling someplace else to do it. Just because someone goes to Montana doesn't mean they're planning to end it all...it may mean they want to see wide open spaces...sheesh! If you ask me Greenberg needs to apologize to those people living in those areas for insulting them like that!
Maybe that "expert's" real problem is jadedness and just plain old burnout...and perhaps Greenberg should seriously consider retiring from being a "travel detective" and just stay home where he needn't ever worry about anything uncomfortable or dangerous or undesirable ruffling his feathers...while the rest of us choose to "GO THERE" and still have fun despite all the various scary "boogeypeople" Greenberg puts out there.
FACT: people go to "dangerous" places all the time, and they live to tell the tale and even share pictures and positive stories about their journey. In fact, sometimes bad things happen to people in good places. That's just life!
Finally, I think it was a pretty crappy move of Greenburg to slam another author in his book (he slammed Patricia Schultz, the woman who wrote the book about 1000 places to go before you die)...talk about unprofessionalism. Maybe he's jealous of that other writer? Sure sounds like it to me.
Product DescriptionWe've all suffered through bad vacations: tourist traps, endless lines, rundown hotels, and the worst airports on earth. Before you book your next trip, get all of the facts--that "idyllic" beachfront hotel could really be one of the world's hellholes. In this follow-up to his New York Times bestseller, The Complete Travel Detective Bible, Peter Greenberg shares his experiences and hard-won knowledge of where not to go and why, so you can make sure your big vacation isn't to a dismal destination. From dangerous roads, crime-ridden cities, and countries overrun with disease to depressing destinations, polluted beaches, and place that (literally) stink, the ultimate travel expert leaves no stone unturned, no garbage heap unexplored, to list the locations you should forget even exist. Backed up by information he has been compiling for years, Greenberg unapologetically exposes misrepresented resorts, corrupt countries, and cringe-worthy cruise ships so that travelers can confidently pack their bags and avoid vacation tragedy.
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