London by London: The Insiders' Guide
RRP £9.99
Paperback, 256 pages
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Reviews
(Rated 1 out of 5)
This book is no more and no less than a collection of question and response emails from Londoners within a usergroup. The posts are roughly collated into categories but otherwise no editing appears to have been done.
It can't really be used as a guide book because nothing is structured or complete, and neither can it be read continuously for pleasure because it's so fragmentary. So it's really at best a toilet read.
I found it particularly frustrating that many of the questions raised in the book, some of them quite intriguing, are only very vaguely answered. Be warned that there is absolutely no researched or expert information here, just email chat.
Stylistically, if you love the kind of humour found in joky casual office emails then this book will be fun, otherwise it may seem increasingly daft and irritating.
(Rated 3 out of 5)
Be Warned. I was disappointed when I received this book; as it is no more than the text of various emails produced by a web site called Londonbylondon.com. It's very little different than reading a forum on a web site. However having said that, some of the information contained within is useful.
(Rated 5 out of 5)
As a recent subscriber to the free weekly newsletter (www.londonbylondon.co.uk), I was very pleased to get my hands on this book full of LBL wisdom and humour. Unique and special and warm. I intend to be in the next one if I possibly can.
(Rated 5 out of 5)
By buying this book you are entering a wonderful world. An alternative London where people are friendly and chat to you about interesting little things that you ought to know if you are going to live in the city.
This is a wonderful guide to London. However, don't think of it as an alphabetical guide that will cover everything and let you look it up however you want. This is a book you can just read at random or cover to cover to find out all those little tit-bits that you only ever normally find out by chatting to people in the pub, and even some of those wonderful nuggets of information that people don't even normally think of telling each other.
(Rated 5 out of 5)
I don't want you to buy this book.
If you buy this book then all of the best jukeboxes, late night chilled out bars, abandoned underground stations, free party venues and salsa classes in the capital will be full to bursting before I get around to doing any of the fun things mentioned.
On the other hand, in the interests of community spirit, this is an excellent guide to almost everything in the capital, all the legwork has been done for you (I wonder what the combined length of London living of all the contributors is?) and it even details a few of the unusual characters that can be found in our captial. A few tips abound, for example it's probably best not to approach the Sinners and Winners man and proclaim yourself an unbeliever.
Oh go on then. Buy it. There's so many suggestions I probably won't have chance to do everything anyway.