Europe on Five Wrong Turns a Day

January 15, 2012
A clever idea for a travel book, executed engagingly though inconsistently. Perhaps the first book by Minneapolis-based freelance writer Mack might best be considered a meta-travel book, a book about travel books, one in particular, and how it all but created the all-American practice of tourism while catering to it. The book that inspired this one is Frommer's Europe on Five Dollars a Day, first published in 1957 and discontinued a half-century later as Europe on $95 a Day). The author found a copy at a book fair, bought it for a dime and discovered that it was something of a talisman for his mother, who used it on her own European travels before marriage. So the author decided to tour Europe using only this ancient, outdated book as a guide, ignoring all updates, successors and the advent of the Internet, doing his best to go, eat and stay where Frommer had advised (knowing that his expenses will extend well past $5 per day). The problem with this concept is that most of those places have closed over the years since the book was published, and the few that remain are either booked (by folks planning ahead with that pesky Internet), radically changed and/or out of Mack's price reach. The author intersperses his travel adventures (which generally are no more unusual or entertaining than anyone else's) with notes from his mother's trip and some higher-concept musing about the impact of Frommer, the changes in travel in general and the changing notion of "tourist" from populist phenomenon to something of an epithet. In the process, Mack offers "cheers, too, to the beaten path; it's beaten for a reason" and learns "to embrace the cliche." He writes of Frommer, "he was to travel as Julia Child was to food: the public figure who arrived at just the right cultural moment and said, with a light but nurturing tone, 'You can do this. It's not that hard. Here's how.' " A genial companion for the armchair traveler.

COPYRIGHT(2012) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

February 15, 2012

The discovery of a 1963 edition of Arthur Frommer's Europe on Five Dollars a Day inspires freelance writer Mack to follow its well-beaten path to Florence, Paris, Amsterdam, Brussels, Berlin, Munich, Zurich, Vienna, Venice, Rome, and Madrid. With the intention of avoiding any current advice, he wanders the cities with his outdated guidebook and finds that many of the recommended restaurants and hotels are closed, booked, or beyond his budget. Comparing past travel experiences to present, he quotes Frommer's book and correspondence from his own mother's 1967 and 1975 European trips. He joins the "tourist dance," where cameras are exchanged so sightseers can have pictures of themselves at famous spots. Based on the blog he kept while overseas, this book shares that medium's anecdotal style: describing his impressions of each city's personality, relating facts about the history of tourism, and ruminating on tourist-flooded locations. Mack, at first timid and uncomfortable, learns to embrace the cliche of visiting places everyone visits. VERDICT Unlike travel books focused on local color or distant destinations, this amusing narrative chronicles a traveler's experience of Europe's hot spots and tourist culture. Recommended--Janet Clapp, MLS, North Clarendon, VT

Copyright 2012 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.