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.Krakow (Lonely Planet Best of ...)

by: Richard Watkins

June 01, 2006
I am a huge fan of Lonely Planet and have many of their country guides. This city guide, however, is superficial in detail and lacks any of the insight that makes the proper Lonely Planet books so great. For half the price of a country guide, you get about 3% of the information. To be fair, there's nothing actually bad about it but I found the free Krakow guide in my hotel room to be more useful.
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Used Price: £3.11

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.Bulgaria (Lonely Planet Country Guide)

by: Richard Watkins, et al

May 01, 2008
I visited Sofia and Plovdiv for 4 days recently, and for my purposes found this guide to be of average usefulness, nothing more. The coverage on Sofia was underwhelming; the main sights and accommodation needs are all well covered, but the recommended eating and drinking venues are rather run-of-the-mill, even lacklustre. Certainly it does not do justice to Sofia's well deserved reputation as an up-and-coming, ultra-hip metropolitan location, where in my experience there is no shortage of exceptional and perfectly affordable bars and restaurants, e.g. 10 leva for a filling and impeccable two-course "Chef's Recommendations" at Upstairs, and the amazing Vinobar which is worth visiting just to see the winelist of 300 varieties.

As ... Read More:
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Used Price: £7.75

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.Italy (Lonely Planet Country Guide)

by: Damien Simonis, Duncan Garwood, Paula Hardy, Alex Leviton, Josephine Quintero, Miles Roddis, Richard Watkins

January 01, 2006
This is a good guide book, as all the guide books in the series, but I did expect a bit more from it. I travelled around Italy together with my husband the summer of 2005, and we used this guide book a lot. But it is a guide book, nothing more. There are quite a bit of things that have changed since the book was last edited, but this is expected. We are planning to send the findings we did to the editor, so that it can be added or changed in the next edition, perhaps.
We felt that the book focused too much on churches, castles etc, and a lot of really interesting things were missed - like the local food markets, which we love to visit. There wasn't much of "different" or "special" recommendations, it was just focusing on the "What to see if ... Read More:
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Used Price: £10.81

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.The Adolescent Psyche: Jungian and Winnicottian Perspectives

by: Mary Watkins, Richard Frankel

February 26, 1998
This is a good guide book, as all the guide books in the series, but I did expect a bit more from it. I travelled around Italy together with my husband the summer of 2005, and we used this guide book a lot. But it is a guide book, nothing more. There are quite a bit of things that have changed since the book was last edited, but this is expected. We are planning to send the findings we did to the editor, so that it can be added or changed in the next edition, perhaps.
We felt that the book focused too much on churches, castles etc, and a lot of really interesting things were missed - like the local food markets, which we love to visit. There wasn't much of "different" or "special" recommendations, it was just focusing on the "What to see if ... Read More:
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Used Price: £14.94

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.Prague (Lonely Planet Best of ...)

by: Richard Watkins

March 01, 2006
This small book at 128 pages is a useful introduction to Prague. It lists all the main sights with opening times and costs, some lesser knwon sights, and some useful information on eating and shopping in the city. It is not comprehensive (otherwise it wouldn't be called a pocket guide) but it does contain a total of 8 useful maps on the front and back cover.

Its size is its most appealing point, easily carried into your pocket or handbag. And with enough information for a short trip, explains why it is the best selling guide.
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Used Price: £2.90

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.At a Stroke: The Rollercoaster of Living with Someone Who Has Had a Stroke

by: Huw Watkins

January 23, 2006
This small book at 128 pages is a useful introduction to Prague. It lists all the main sights with opening times and costs, some lesser knwon sights, and some useful information on eating and shopping in the city. It is not comprehensive (otherwise it wouldn't be called a pocket guide) but it does contain a total of 8 useful maps on the front and back cover.

Its size is its most appealing point, easily carried into your pocket or handbag. And with enough information for a short trip, explains why it is the best selling guide.
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Used Price: £1.40

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.Poland (Lonely Planet Country Guide)

by: Tom Parkinson, Richard Watkins, Neil Wilson

May 01, 2005
Travel guide purchasing often comes down to a choice between Lonely Planet and Rough Guide, and the case of Poland, Lonely Planet is in second place.

On a week long visit to Poland in April 2006, carrying a copy of the Lonely Planet guide and accompanied by a friend who had the equivalent Rough Guide, we found the Rough Guide to be the superior volume.

Lonely Planet has the basic information on eating, drinking and sleeping, and there is little to choose between the two popular guides for those, but for history, culture and background information we found the Rough Guide to be far better. As well as being more readable, the Rough Guide also seemed to include more of the smaller but no less interesting towns where we ended ... Read More:
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Used Price: £6.00

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.Bulgaria (Lonely Planet Country Guide)

by: Richard Watkins, Tom Masters

June 01, 2005
I visited Sofia and Plovdiv for 4 days recently, and for my purposes found this guide to be of average usefulness, nothing more. The coverage on Sofia was underwhelming; the main sights and accommodation needs are all well covered, but the recommended eating and drinking venues are rather run-of-the-mill, even lacklustre. Certainly it does not do justice to Sofia's well deserved reputation as an up-and-coming, ultra-hip metropolitan location, where in my experience there is no shortage of exceptional and perfectly affordable bars and restaurants, e.g. 10 leva for a filling and impeccable two-course "Chef's Recommendations" at Upstairs, and the amazing Vinobar which is worth visiting just to see the winelist of 300 varieties.

As for Plovdiv, the ... Read More:
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Used Price: £5.88

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.Professional Java Tools for Extreme Programming: Ant, Xdoclet, Junit, Cactus and Maven (Programmer to Programmer)

by: Richard Hightower, Warner Onstine, Paul Visan, Damon Payne, Joseph D. Gradecki, Kate Rhodes, Robert Watkins, Erik Meade

April 23, 2004
This book is usefull to understand a set of java tool for XP, but it can be only a starting point to learn and to use them.
Ant and Xdoclet are the most interesting parts.
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Used Price: £14.56

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.Gladiator

by: Richard Ross Watkins

March 28, 2001
Richard Watkins' book on the gladiators of Rome is a welcome addition to the sparse literature on these most fascinating 'sports figures' and the 'games' they engaged in. Targeted principally for the younger readers, it is still an enjoyable read for anyone interested in the professional swordsmen of the arena. The illustrations are quite good, although a more colourful and detailed medium than graphite might have better served to capture the parade-like splendour of the events. Gladiator is an worthwhile companion to Michael Grant's harder to find (and more detailed) Gladiators (also highly recommended).
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Used Price: £5.34