[.ca] Eyewitness Travel Guides Hawaii (ISBN 0789427508)

Too short, too high level:
We own about 15 of the DK Eyewitness Travel guides, and have dogeared the pages over several trips. They are amazingly useful. But this one is not their best effort. Hawaii is a very diverse place, and to try and "hit the highlights" in a travel guide is a mistake. This book is right at 200 pages, but almost 80 are about Honolulu, Wakiki and Oahu, leaving only 120 pages for all of the other islands. Even the pieces about Oahu (with little info about the west coast/Makaha and just a mattering on the North Shore) and Honolulu (with a few measly paragraphs on Pearl Harbor) is scant. As I said, I love the DK Eyewitness series, it is the first travel book when get when going someplace new. But for Hawaii, there are several other books more in-depth. If you are going to Maui or The Big Island, I suggest getting Maui:Revealed or Hawaii The Big Island: Revealed (each 300 pages, pictures, maps, etc.)

Nice photos:
Not the book for you if you're wanting detailed information about hotels, restaurants, etc.

Lukewarm:
I have just one problem with this book and that's with what good guides normally do: provide more than just a few sentences about a place. For me it was too casual. I bought it in too much of a hurry, an impuse buy.

A Great Book With Fabulous Photos:
I first discovered these books (a series Eyewitness Travel) by accident. These books are very useful because of all the photos, cut away views, museum pictures, and maps and historical details. On a cold day back here in the USA (or Canada) or elsewhere, have a glass of wine and sit in a nice chair or in the garden on a warm day and read this book. For a moment you will be back on your favorite beach or restaurant in Hawaii. The photos and desicriptions and cutaway drawings are excellent. Plus they throw in some history and details on the art and many other things of interest. A solid 200 page effort - lots of stuff to see and absorb. What is attractive about this book is that it gives a review of each of the islands with history, some politics, and a nice index. I like the part on Kauai, that is my favorite island. But the book brings it all to life with just magnificent photos and maps. Jack in Toronto

Love Hawaii:
This book is great even though I've never read a single word the cover is very fasinating. I love Hawaii and I would really like to do to France sometime. However this book seems rather superfluous really compared to others. I mean I like kangeroos, but do I like them THAT much. I'm not sure. Oh well. This is a wonderful book because it's sixteen dollars cheaper here than at this other store where it was thirty. It's not very concise like this other book I read about Hawaii. In that book the words were garbled so it was very difficult to read...I think it might have been written in Spanish. Anyway I love Hawaii.