Some thoughts please on the best travel book for Paris and Normandy (accomadations, dining, etc) Going in Sept. 2017. Thanks.

Michelin Guides

I agree that the Michelin Green Guides are the best guidebooks for these areas.

But I don't use guidebooks for accommodations (I prefer the information on booking.com and tripadvisor). The Michelin Red is, IME, great for high-end dining in Paris and Normandy. For a wider range of options, consider Fodor's forum.

Michelin is good for some in depth site information, but not so much for "practicalities". Don't overlook Rick Steves for great practical information, especially in Paris, and especially for first timers to Europe. I know he gets put down a lot on this forum, but most of those people have been many times. I had lived in Europe as a teenager, but still found his Paris guidebook extremely useful when I went back to Paris after many years.

This Fodors Forum is a terrific help, too, for specific questions. Except for a few people who enjoy making people feel stupid for asking certain questions. But that's really a minority to ignore, and you can benefit from most on here.

Rick Steves is good for first timers, though less useful for budget travelers than he used to be, but there is a lot of geography he doesn't cover. For logistics I find Lonely Planet or Rough Guide (I prefer the LP format) more useful. For "better" accommodation and dining there is, of course, Fodors itself...

For Normandy, the Green Guide hands down. Once there, there are guides in the gift shops that are nice too.
And actually, it was the Green Guide that recommended the excellent Petite Bistro in Bayeux.

The Michelin Greens are the standard for sights and history. Rick Steves is the comic book version.

Lonely planet and Rough Guides are opinionated guides that are worthwhile including small town, but are horrible on hotels and restaurants.

For maps, sights, museums, parks, monuments, getting a city overview I think printed guidebooks are useful.

Specifically for accommodations and restaurants (as asked about) then I think online resources are likely better because they are more easily kept current.

Although the Michelin Green Guides have fantastic and thorough information, my favorite guides to carry with me as I traveled through Paris and Normandy were the Eyewitness Travel Top 10 series. They are the perfect size to slip into your purse and/or backpack and they have great information and recommendations! Some of our favorite meals were from places we found in the Top 10 guides.

Have a wonderful trip! We loved being in both those areas in 2016!

well, I hate Eyewitness guidebooks, I think they are the worst ones out there.

I like Michelin but mainly as a reference work. I don't think they are a very good general guidebook, actually because they are organized solely alphabetically by the names of places. I think other guidebooks flow a lot better in getting a feel for what you might do in an area and how it all flows together. Michelin is okay if you just want info about specific places you already have selected. It's pretty dry, also, in terms of writing style.

My favorite probably is the Cadogan guides in France, actually, I really liked their South of France book, but I think they are out of business now (they had a Paris one many years ago). Then, I do like both Fodors and Frommers, actually, I think they are both readable and organized well. I thought Fodors in Spain was the best, it does vary a little by country, I don't think I've gotten a guidebook for Paris and Normandy area for many years as I've been there so much.

I do like Rick Steves for some areas, like Switzerland I think he does well, but I don't think he does Paris very well.

Ultimately, I think this is personal to some extent. For example, I hate Eyewitness books but I know some people like them.

I agree that guide books are personal. When trying to choose a book for a destination, I see how different books handle something I am especially interested in doing. That usually works for me.

Before I travel, I visit the neighboring town's library. I find they have the best selection of books in my general area. I check Fodors, Frommer's, Rick Steves' and whatever else I can find and make a rough itinerary. I find different things in different books. Rick Steves is good for first timers and gives basic info. In recent years, I like to use tripadvisor for hotel and restaurant suggestions. Each different book serves my different needs. I would also recommend Rick Steves' phrase books. Much better that an English/foreign language dictionary as we speak in sentences, not words!

I'm a big fan of the Cadogan guides, but they aren't the most convenient to tote around. They have great coverage of the history of places and make good pre-trip reading. I like the Michelin guides for their sightseeing itinerary recommendations and in-depth information on places, descriptions of architecture, and much more. The Michelin red guides are the gold standard for hotels and restaurants.

Interesting! I’ve never counted a “top-10’ book as a real guidebook, and I’ve never seen one that bears anything more than the slightest similarity to anything that would rank in my top 10 for any place I’ve visited (with maybe 4 items, at most, on it's list that would be on mine). And I’ve never found value to a Rick Steves guidebook; I find them a waste of money. JMO.

I'm a big fan of the Cadogan guides, but they aren't the most convenient to tote around.
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I agree Underhill. They are a bit dry but extremely useful, but they do not seem available for many places.
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I must say that Fodor's Spain 2016 was a vast improvement over early Fodor's guides. There was more about culture, history, smaller towns, and especially food. There were brief but accurate explanations about regional cuisine. My only conclusion was that they were no longer catering to first times but repeat offenders. In the past they were mirror images of Frommer's.