Hour Chicago: Twenty-five 60-Minute Self-guided Tours of Chicago's Great Architecture and Art Review

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Hour Chicago: Twenty-five 60-Minute Self-guided Tours of Chicago's Great Architecture and Art ReviewOther guidebooks can tell you where to eat, where to stay, what to wear or what plays to go to. But if you love cities because of their art and architecture, if you want to get off the tour bus, THIS is the guidebook you want.
The author is the perfect guide. After a few pages, you feel like you've gotten to know her, and you're eager to get her opinions on whatever she shows you on the next page. She's not afraid to say when she thinks a building is dull, which is a nice change from the hype of most tourist guides. But when she likes something, it's obvious. Somehow she can explain what makes a painting, sculpture or building great, in just a few choice words. You get the feeling she knows way more than she has space to share. But "share" is the word. She doesn't talk down to the reader, but she also knows that not everyone has a masters in fine art and architecture. There's a great glossary and good maps, which you'll need, because this guide doesn't stop at the Art Institute and the Loop. It takes you into the neighborhoods for galleries, architecture and smaller museums with collections that are world-class, but are overshadowed by the Art Institute.
The book is the perfect size for a backpack or fanny pack -- you can tell it's meant to be USED. The prose is clean and direct, and should not be a problem for tourists whose 1st language is not English.
It's organized into short tours that you really can take if you only have an hour, but you can also string them together if you're lucky enough to have a weekend or a lifetime. (This book is not just for tourists. It's must for people who live here, especially if you already think you know the city.)
What I like most about this book is that it seems to have a special place in its heart for the person who is by himself or herself. Anyone who's travelled to a great city alone has felt at times the lack of a companion to share the experience with. You find yourself wanting to turn to someone and see your excitement reflected back. In "Hour Chicago,"that person is the author. You feel like, whether she's physically there or not, she wrote this book for you and is hoping to see her excitement reflected back in you.Hour Chicago: Twenty-five 60-Minute Self-guided Tours of Chicago's Great Architecture and Art Overview

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Ethnic Chicago: A Multicultural Portrait Review

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Ethnic Chicago: A Multicultural Portrait ReviewThis is a very well written, well organized and interesting book about the ethnic history of Chicago. Starting from the early settlers, the authors write about the history of different ethnic groups such as Poles, Ukranians, Germans, Chinese, Japanese and Greeks among others. Most, if not all chapters are written by someone from the ethnic group in question, and each chapter seems to be very well researched. I admire the neutral and scientific writing style. In other words, there is no hint of side taking, even when the authors describe recent and painful conflicts between ethnic groups. This is just how a research book should be.
The book is easy to read, and I found it very illuminating. It is a very good source of information about Chicago. The book traces the history of different ethnic groups in Chicago through the 19th and 20th century, their struggles for adaptation, their neighborhoods, occupations, and life styles. After reading the book, I feel I appreciate the diversity of this great city even more. I learned many things I did not know about this city from this book, and I keep looking for the neighborhoods and landmarks mentioned in the book with interest.
The book is also a very good source of reliable information about American history in general, because the immigration patterns in Chicago and the process of adaptation of the immigrants to American life occured in somewhat similar ways to other large cities, and in several chapters, the authors discuss the immigration of a certain ethnic group to the USA in general, as well as to Chicago in particular.
Finally, I found the book very helpful in terms of information about recent world history. The reasons that led the ethnic groups in question to immigrate to USA and Chicago (the push factors) are shortly discussed in each chapter, and this gives the reader an overall idea about the recent history of each of the nations in question.
The editors of the book did a very good job in ensuring continuity across chapters. Even though each chapter is written by a different author, I did not feel any gaps between chapters, and did not think there were any problems of continuity.
This looked like a thick book with 600+ pages, but I finished it in a few weeks, and I think this was time well spent.Ethnic Chicago: A Multicultural Portrait Overview

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Walking Chicago: 31 Tours of the Windy City's Classic Bars, Scandalous Sites, Historic Architecture, Dynamic Neighborhoods, and Famous Lakeshore Review

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Walking Chicago: 31 Tours of the Windy City's Classic Bars, Scandalous Sites, Historic Architecture, Dynamic Neighborhoods, and Famous Lakeshore ReviewI would strongly suggest this book is not useful to Chicago visitors.
It has 31 tours, more than a typical visitor can do in a few days, but does not offer effective ways to prioritize/connect. The walks are poorly indexed (yes, they are numbered from South to North and there is a "per theme" index, and a minimalistic "connecting walks" line at the end of each tour, but that is all).
I've tried to use 5 different tours during a short first time visit and not once I finished the walk as recommended (because the routes are not efficient in covering the interesting parts of the city).
There are enough typos and mistakes (swapping "right" for "left" and "51st St" for "55th St" - try to follow the Washington Park or Hyde Park tours, for example) sprinkled all over. Not a big deal in a regular guide, but crucial in a walking tour.
Try to walk half mile across Washington Park "in the Southeast direction", without any reference and a bad map and end up exactly where the tour picks up on the other side (where the book assumes you are at a very exact place, but you have no idea where it is).
The access/transit info is mostly correct, but minimalistic enough to be useless.
Even when the author is "witty", it is at the expense of function. Millennium Park is one of the most touristy places in Chicago (no need for directions) but he spends several pages making up names for the landmarks and mixing real and "funny" names. What does the reader win in exchange for the confusion? Viagra fountain jokes. Then, in the same walk, crossing Grant Park, when there is opportunity for a guide book to add real value, the text is vague and sparse.
I don't mean to say it is all garbage. But the purpose of a walking tour book is to be read while you use it walking the city. For that purpose, in a city as easy to walk as Chicago, you would be better off with regular travel book and common sense than trying to follow the tours in this book.
Walking Chicago: 31 Tours of the Windy City's Classic Bars, Scandalous Sites, Historic Architecture, Dynamic Neighborhoods, and Famous Lakeshore Overview

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