Best Rome guidebooks?
 

I'm making a trip to the U.S. next week and plan to crash Border's to pick up guidebooks for our trip to Rome over Christmas. I will pick up Fodor's Italy, naturally, but can anyone recommend their favorite guidebooks specifically for Rome? We will have five full days and are interested in long walks, ancient ruins, great views, and high-quality dining, more than art museums.

DK Eyewitness is my favorite, but my husband brought hom the Knopf Guides Rome last night and it's a great book as well.

Cadogan and Access have good Rome guides; both very different. I also like Time Out for restaurants.

Hello hausfrau. My son-in-law who was born and raised in Rome but lives here in N CA now gave me a Rome Guide book a few years ago. He checked out all of the various guide books and ended up buying the DK Eyewitness book as he felt that was the best.

I like the Rough Guide.

I like Fodor's See It Rome.

Two that i just used were Lonely Planet and Lonely Planet Guide to Eating and Drinking in Rome. In addition Frommers is pretty comprehensive.

DK Eyewitness Guides for me, too. Lots of photos, lots of maps, and (how do I say this?...) drawings of famous buildings with their roofs cut away, so you can see the interiors.
((S))((*))

Georgina Masson's Companion Guide to Rome is one of my favorites. Mostly concerned with highly detailed walks all over the city. Best read before, and after, your trip. It's *written* -- some people think overly so. But, friends of mine who live in Rome consider it the best.

I just bought the Oxford Archaeological Guide to Rome and hope to put it to the test soon!

At the risk of offending the sponser of this board, I don't think you need the Fodor's Italy book. If you are just going to Rome, you don't need a heavy book the gives a basic overview of many places that you aren't visiting. Looking at your interests, I'd also recommend Eyewitness Rome for your overall guide, then for ancient ruins, there is Amanda Claridge's Oxford Archaeological Guide to Rome and also Georgina Masson's Companion Guide to Rome. For walks, look for the latest edition of Romewalks. Timeout Rome publishes a separate guidebook to restaurants which is well worth picking up.

I'm using Fodors See-It Rome a lot. It is great. It is a little like the DK Eyewitness books, but is easier for me to read and follow. I also like the small pocket book series by DK Eyewitness: Top Ten Rome. Excellent for at-a-glance references.

-Bill

Three GREAT books if you are bringing them to Rome are the Moon Metro Rome "Unfold the City" book (we used this exclusively walking around - great fold-out maps by area showing shops and restaurant locations, the AAA Spiral guide for Rome - good for itineraries, and the Knopf Mapguide - very similar to Moon - Great maps for each area with descriptions and pictures. I find the print on these maps easier to read than Moon.

We also like the Rome Access guide - great shop, restaurant, and scenic listings, with descriptions of each area.

Rick Steves is good for detailed transportation information and "hints" like going out the tour door of the Sistine Chapel to get into St. Peters. I don't like most of his recommendations for hotels/restaurants though.

I reccomend the Inside Out guide book. It is a small book so you could carry it with you. It has a couple of nice pop out maps, a compas, and of course all sorts of info. on sights, attractions, eating, etc.
I have never been to Rome, but I used this book for both my London and Paris trips. Just bought one last weekend for Rome, as I am planning a trip in may!

By the time everyone is done we will have recommended everybook. Actually if i had to get just one i would do Frommers.

I'm going to Rome during Xmas week, so I've bought 4 guidebooks (Lonely Planet Rome, Rick Steves Rome, Frommers Rome Day by Day, and Frommers Irreverent Rome), plus I have 2 older versions of Italy guidebooks (DK and Frommers) (yeah, I'm a freak).

My favorites are the Lonely Planet and the Frommers Day by Day, both of which I'll be bringing with me. Not only are they interesting and detailed and have great maps, but they are also thin and easy to carry around.

I have DK and Knopf. They are certainly beautiful descriptive books. I also have the Baedekers Italy which is sort of thin on Rome. Also, the Cadogan Rome, Venice, Florence which has a lot of very interesting information, much like other Cadogan books. I save the best for last, the Michelin Green Guide to Rome. Study the others before you go but bring this one with you. Four stars.

I have the DK Eyewitness and the Unofficial Guide to Central Italy.

I liked the DK guide, as it has detailed photos, so I could determine in advance whether or not I wanted to visit a place. But I also found that to be a bit of a detraction - if I thought the picture looked too stuffy or too "Old Masters", I didn't want to go to the place. The book is also incredibly heavy for its size, due to the thick, color pages. Definitely not a book you want to lug around with you on the streets of Rome every day.

I like the Unofficial Guide series, as a general rule, and I thought the Central Italy (Florence, Tuscany, Siena, Rome, Latium) one was pretty good. It did a very good job with Rome attractions and maps, and it is helpful if you're considering sidetrips. There were a lot of restaurant recommendations, but not nearly as many as there would be in an all-Rome guide. But it is enjoyable and easy to read.

As for maps - I think it's a good idea to take a map from the little English tourist magazine that is in a lot of Rome hotel rooms (I can't remember the name of it, but the same company had a magazine in San Francisco, so it's a whole international thing) and fold it in your pocket, so you don't always have to have the guidebook. I kept my folded map in my back pocket at all times, and it usually was detailed enough to help us find everything we were looking for.

Has anyone tried the National Geographic Guide to Rome? I'm also getting ready to start purchasing a few books in preparation for my stay in Rome. Heard this one was pretty good--National Geographic status, etc. Any reviews of this one??

This is one of those threads that comes up periodically and everyone has an opinion such that nearly all the guides get mentioned.
I think that the first distinction that needs to br made is prep guides that are useful before (and even after) the trip and guides that are useful on the ground.
Books that have to be carried around need to have a high and wide information to weight ratio. Yhe Eyewitness guides are heavy and fail this test in my opinion but are very useful in getting aquainted with Rome (or any other place) while you are planning your trip. After all a trip to Rome is all about editing and making choices since the old quote is " a lifetime is not enough".
Each guide has strengths and weaknesses and I reviewed them all before our month in Rome and still couldn't chose one or ten so I took about twenty knowing that I would be there a long time and with a wide range of interests. I was guided by this aricle on SlowTrav.com "Books on Rome" by Robert Barrett:
http://www.slowtrav.com/italy/rome/rb_books.htm
There are a couple that he doesn't mention that I found very useful in my day to day itineraries:
Not Built in a Day: Exploring the Architecture of Rome by George H. Sullivan 2006. My now dog eared copy travelled with me most days and if one is interested in the architecture of Rome (it is my field) this is the most readable and thorough guide I've seen. It is well organized with walking tours and an amazingly astute work by a non professional (he is a travel writer).
I am obviously writing to a general topic here, I am not suggesting that this would be specifically useful to hausfrau with only five days to cover all of Rome.
Another new guide just published in 2006 that I took but found too heavy to carry around but may well be the definitive guide, incorporating Masson (better as a planning guide)and aspects of the Blue Guide (which I sometimes found useful) and the Oxford Archeological Guide (which I didn't use at all but feel I should read just to be an educated man):
Rome: a practical Guideto the History and Culture of the Eternal City" by Mauro, Paola, Eric and Jack Lucentini (!) published by Pallas Guides. This book illustrates the problem faced by guide writers and publishers and that is how to be "definitive" and still be useful when on the ground.
I did a lot of background reading as oer Barrett list but when in Rome I found that the 2 or 3 max guides that I carried in my pack were often left alone much of the day as we wandered. I had prepared, knew the city in a map sense, knew what to expect and then just sort of encountered it as it occurred. If I needed to know more, then I would grab what was hopefully the right book and read about that item. Depending on what the focus of the day was I carried at various times:
"Not Built in a Day", "Blue Guide", "Time Out Rome", "Rome in Detail: a Guide For the Expert Traveller", Michelin Green Guide", "Companion Guide" and probably most often and the two most useful books in terms of negotiating the daily life in the city:
"Time for Food Rome: Your Guide to Good Value Eating and Drinking" Thomas Cook 2001 (wish they would update) and The Civilized Shoppers Guide to Rome" Keetch and Brucia 2004. Why? Because they were kight and small and always gave us what we needed when we needed like food, gelato and wine where we were when we were.

Thanks so much everyone! I appreciate your thoughtful responses. I knew I was opening a can of worms when I asked this question but I wanted to hear different opinions. I'm going to print out this list and take it with me to the bookstore to help me make my selections.

Grinisa, I don't think the Fodor's police will hunt you down for your comment! ;-) I figured I would get Fodor's Italy since I will probably be planning another trip to northern Italy next year and I like them for general trip planning. I agree they are often too big and too general to lug around.