Switzerland Books

As a frequent business traveler, I have gotten to rely on the Michelin Guides for my dining choices. It has usually served me very well. However, I was a bit disappointed on my recent trip to Rome. I was thoroughly impressed with my dining experience at La Pergola Restaurant at the Cavalieri Hilton. Your guide rates this as one star. (possibly underrated). Using your same guide, I dined with several business colleagues at the Sans Souci Restaurant. My experience here was not comparable to my dining experience at La Pergola. (In fact, it was much less). Presentation, service, and quality were not on the same level. My business colleagues, who also dined with me at La Pergola, shared these views as well. In my opinion, either the rating on the Sans Souci should be decreased or the rating of La Pergola should be increased. I would suggest that you review both restaurants again and make the necessary adjustments to your next issue.

Complete useful and well done information package for people visiting Auvergne, France. Appreciated detailed tour descriptions.

An excellent review of the life and art of Angelica Kauffman. It could have used more illustrations and a bit less of the "background", but, given the intent of this 18th century artist to keep her life as private as possible, it was a good book and a good read.

The magical world of movado comes to light in this exceptional work on "the history of time". Very informative work with nice illustrations is all that the true movado enthusiast really needs. I strongly suggest that if you already own, or if you are considering a movado classic timepiece, that you pick up this book and spend some time on learning about the making of time.

My husband and I have always wanted to travel on the Glacier Express and he suggested that instead of making it a two day event in a week long trip, that we make traveling the train the whole trip. I didn�t see how we could turn an 8 hour train trip into a week of vacation. Fortunately, I found this book.

It starts as many guide books do with the essential travel information. It give you average temperatures and rainfall for given time of the year, the electricity requirements, customs, etc., etc.

The second section of the book is concerned with traveling by train. The third gives a country by country breakdown of travel hints, again it lists consulates and valuable tourist info.

But the real value of this book is the next section. It lists all the really great train journeys through the Alps. The wonderful thing about this book is that it covers the Alps, not just Switzerland. So not only to you get descriptions of the Swiss rail trips, but you also get descriptions of trips that go across country boundaries. So this book covers, Austria, France, Germany, Italy, Slovenia and Switzerland. For each route, the book supplies you with the route, where to change trains, the time of travel, places to stay, places to eat and places to see. The places to stay, eat and see may need a little supplementation from another source, but the route info itself is worth the price of admission.

The only book I've ever seen that systematically explains the development of the Swiss as mercenaries. Includes when, how, & why the Swiss began to sell their military prowess to the rest of Europe. Gives an overview of early Switzerland and many of its battles for independence. The accounts of later battles are limited to those that illustrate important tactics or changes.

The book appears to be targeted at military historians. Also of keen interest to people of Swiss heritage. Especially fun to compare folk history / family stories with the author's observations.

The ferocity of the Swiss mercenaries may be shocking to some, but that was one of the keys to their success. As the author puts it, their weapons & tactics could be copied, but their ferocity couldn't.

Several illustrations from paintings, sketches and such. Bibliography looks good. Contains some English titles.

Suggest reading "Target Switzerland" for a view of the Swiss citizen army during WWII.

A very good and beautifully illustrated museum guide, a bit too extensive, though, on the building itself and the story of how and why the museum was conceived. But it is the largest collection of Klee's works in the world, so if you can't make it to Bern, buy the book.

I have not finished reading it yet, but I find it very interessing..it gives the idea on what is like living in Switzerland. Paul point out every sort of difference between Sw. and England..for me (I'm Swissitalian) it's very funny to see how Sw. is described by someone that comes for the first time to this land that seems to be a world apart.

If someone has already read it please contact me I need some information for my English homewk.

Thanks Tonelo

Steven Ozment's Reformation in The Cities was a great read that combined the Medieval Concept of traditional theory in studying the Reformation with the modern social contemporary view of humanistic Reformation history. Truly a great piece of work!

Too many people (and too many engineers) fail to understand that great engineering is about creation and imagination. Robert Maillart was first and foremost a great engineer, but he was also a wonderful artist.

This book (in English and German) traces his works from 1905 to his death (about 1940). Billington shows how Maillart takes his designs, step by step, from the historical stone arch design to the modern use of reinforced concrete. His bridges are wonderfully designed to be functional as well as perfectly suited to their placement in the environment.

Because of their locations deep in the Swiss countryside, they tend to be difficult to view and photograph. But Billington includes excellent photographs (both historic and contemporary).

The best part about the book is the way Billington shows that the later works are built upon the concepts explored in the earlier works. There are some discussions of engineering concepts, but this is really a book about art and aesthetics, not about stress and strain. As Maillart proved, you can provide gorgeous aesthetics and still create structures that serve a useful purpose for 100 years (and still going strong).

I wish the chapter about his influence on later engineers had been more developed. I also wish there could have been more discussion of the economics involved, perhaps a detailed exploration of one of the design competitions. (Maillart had to not only build the bridges, but he also had to be the low-bidder!)