Disney Books

I truly believe this book made our vacation the BEST ever!!!! We never shood in line once!!!!!!!!!!! I highly recommend it!!!!

Traveling to Walt Disney World without reading this book is dangerous. Understanding the many facets and choices to be made is critical and this book provides all necessary info. I have been there many times and always obtain the latest edition of this book with fabulous results.

This is a comprehensive guide to the enormous vacation spot known as "Disney world." We were able to check out all the restaurants and make early reservations before our last trip. My principal concerns were the very small print and low color contrast in the print. Anyone with any reading problems (such as myself) would not find it convenient to use.

This book was such a great help! I purchased several other, but this was by far, the most comprehensive and best written!

I bought this book along with the PassPorter, and this book blows the other away by far! The thickness of the book may seem overwhelming, but you only have to read the sections that pertain to you and your trip. The information was extremely helpful, and delivered in an amusing voice. This book was certainly written for any reader - neither over nor under the majority of readers' heads. Also the reviews of rides and dining were just right - not too in-depth but certainly very helpful.

I highly recommend this book for anyone planning a trip to Disney!

We have always used the Unofficial guide but discovered the Complete WDW just recently. This book has a myriad of awesome colorful pictures--here's what WDW looks like! The only drawback is that, unlike the Unofficial guide, this book doesn't ever criticize WDW or give actual reader input.

Bottom line: it's worth the money. WDW lovers will read and reread the book!

I purchased this book right before a fall trip to Disney World with my 3 teenagers, and it was the best thing I did. A lot of detailed information about restaurants and tips on where to get good snacks was right on target. We were able to find some wonderful out-of-the-way places to eat for a good value while in the parks that we may not have stumbled upon on our own. The book also recommends various attractions by placing a check mark next to them, which helps plan your day if you are trying to make the most of your time. Overall, this is an excellent book with exceptional insights.

Very interesting, informative, with a fantastic amount of interesting pictures of Walt Disney World. It's small size will make it easy to carry- even to take along to the parks. The authors certainly did a lot of research for this book. Wonderful!

This was an excellent guide. The pictures were vibrant, the facts entertaining. This guide is good if you want to learn about the parks/rides/entertainment. It's not a commando scheduler.

This book will give you the best idea on what to expect from a ride. I combined it with the WDWR Econoguide and it was the best mix. I had borrowed about 8 guides from the library and these two are the best.

Grandchild really enjoyed the book. One of her favorites since not many kids books are about girls.

I purchased this book several months ago for my daughter. She is now nine months old and really enjoys it. Each page is filled with brightly colored objects as well as 3 or 4 different textures to touch. We have another touch and feel book but it doesn't have a story line. On each set of pages, this book has 4-5 sentences describing each of the textured items on those pages and how Violet or her mother use them. I read the sentences and we feel the textures together. Her eyes light up each time we flip to a new page. She absolutely loves this book and I recommend purchasing it for your child.

This is really an awesome book for tactile children. My son loves the book so much that he kisses Violet and her mom on every page they appear. The only concern I have,at least in my 2 editions, is the very last line of the book doesn't make sense. It says, "At Violet's dreaming happy dreams until the morning light." I think this maybe a typographical error. Otherwise, it is a great book for babies and toddlers to explore and to begin a love for reading.

I bought this for my almost 1 yr old granddaughter. She loves it and it has so many things to feel on 1 page.

I have to say that I am only a so-so fan of Baby Einstein products, and novelty books don't usually do it for me. But my one-year-old just LOVES this book. It is far and away her favorite and she wants it over and over at least a dozen times a day. It's already clear to me that she can make associations between the words I am saying and what she is touching at the time, and the variety of feelable surfaces are delightful. The rhymes are cute and just long enough without being too long between page turns for small attention spans. My only criticism would be that the book is quite large and doesn't fit on all bookcase shelves, and it's a little bit heavy for a one-year-old on her wobbly little feet to bring over to me, but she likes it so much, that she manages. Definitely recommended and a cute gift for a one-year-old birthday.

This book was excellent in giving us advice for which rides to ride, which rides to skip, which places to eat at, and which places to skip (because of the cost, haha). It even has fold out maps so we didn't have to get them separately and tote them all around, and they were very helpful--we used them every day. It also tells you the costs of all the hotels, if you're looking for that, as well. We especially enjoyed Port Orleans French Quarter. This book even has a special place for character autographs for your children so you don't have to buy one for $10! Buy this book and enjoy your trip even more!

I received my copy today of the Passporter 2005. This will be our first trip to WDW and now we are even more excited after reading through this book!!! I love that it is so compact, yet FULL of helpful information. Also, I like that the book can be closed so nothing will fall out. It is perfect to take into the Parks. It is like the Walt Disney World "Bible". A must for first time travelers to WDW!!!!

This is a wonderful book. It is cleverly written and organized with lots of ample room for the reader to journal, take notes and store paper momentos. I can hardly wait to take this with me on our Walt Disney World Vacation in a few short weeks. The authors have provided AWESOME information to make sure that my family has a great vacation. If you are looking for the perfect tour guide to WDW this is it!

I LOVE this book!!! I live in FL but hadn't been to Disney in years, so I decided to buy a planning book before our big trip. Well, I sure got more than I bargained for with this book. It has useful information about every resort, restaurant and ride...and more! The passporter pockets make it convenient to store your hotel confirmations, priority seating confirmations and tickets prior to your trip. The fold-out maps are great too!

In addition to the wealth of information provided in the book, Jennifer and Dave have a wonderful website that I highly recommend for more information about Disney, including updates to the book. If you are planning a Disney trip OR if you just love WDW, GET THIS BOOK. I can't say enough about it.

If you have read any of the other reviews you already know this series inspires strong praise and I agree with all of it. I'd like to add one more reason to appreciate this book- there is NO approximation of the WDW LOGO! you may be wondering why that would be a good thing so I'll tell you. We have a 4year old who can not read yet but has the brand recognition skills of a savant- I have had this book for a few days and not a shread of curiosity about it yet. Which translates into PEACEFUL planning. We won't be tackling the mouse till Dec. and I don't think I can stand almost 3 months of "IS IT TIME YET?????"

This is the third edition of this book that I have bought. I love the format of them. They are imformative, yet entertaining. I am a "planner", and this helps keep me organized. We had made the major decisions of where to eat & where to go when in advance. I've been a Disney fan for years as are my children now. This book gave helpful tips when it came to deciding where & when to do things. I highly recommend it & look forward to the next edition.

We used this for many months before our vacation last year. It was almost drenched with highlighter markings long before we left for Florida. When we got there, it was like our Bible as we toured the parks. It has everything you need to know for Disney and beyond. Her sense of humor is most amusing and she does let you know where to eat without losing your mind or cookies with toddler in tow. So buy it and then keep it, because you will write notes in it and after your trip it will become almost a souvenir of sorts with all your little articles and receipts etc, tucked away in side. You will look through it a year or two later and laugh at your comments about whatever you were thinking at the time. We had teenagers and toddler and everything worked out great, she has some real tips that do everyone good, not just the kids. Mom and dad won't lose their mind trying to please everyone. We are heading to Universal as well this year, so we will definitely be buying her Universal book.

Since we take so few vacations, I like to make sure they're planned well so everyone gets the most out of them. I bought 3 Disney books (Unofficial Guide by Sehlinger and Birnbaum's 2001 edition too) but this is the one I found most useful for planning a trip with a 4 & 6 year-old. The tips saved us $1000 on room costs alone! The reviews of the Disney and off-site hotels offer useful details not found on websites. The excellent ride reviews feature details to help parents determine if it's too scary for your child (tells you if dark, noisy, surprise elements, etc) - not just a generic "may scare children under age 5" warning. The book is fun & easy to read... and with her realistic advice for visiting Disney with kids, you'll have more fun and be less stressed-out on vacation than if you did it without her book.

As you see from most of the reviews of this book it is an excellent source of information. As the author notes, the level of enjoyment of your trip is directly related to the amount of research you do before your trip.

In addition to being a great source of information before we left, it was a great read on the drive to Orlando. As parents, so much time is spent on the planning that the joyful anticipation of the trip is often left to the kids. The more we read and closer we got, the more excited we got.

One personal caveat that is inferred in the book, but not stated expressly is that the Disney experience can be lost on young kids. Our six-year-old had an absolute blast, our 3 1/2-year-old was a bit tentative about the characters and some of the shows, but our two-year old was scared by the characters (I don't think he understood that they would be life-sized) and the shows created sensory overload. Several parents of young children we talked to said they would not repeat the experience with a child younger than four. We heartily second that.

I have a three year old daughter, and this book was a tremendous help in planning out trip to Disney World. It told us when and where to find the characters (a BIG item for planning the days), what rides to ride first, and most importantly, the information about FastPass. I highly recommend the book to anyone taking kids to DisneyWorld.

Both of my grandaughters (ages 10 and 7) are heavily into the Disney Fairies world. They loved the book. The illustrations are beautiful.

I love this book. I bought it for the younger kids who use the school library I work in, but my 8th graders won't give it up! They love it. A great book for all ages.

This was a present for my daughter bday. It came fast and was able to find a frame for it. It makes a great addition to her room!

My 6-yr. old granddaughter opened her present. When she saw the fairy book she squealed and then hugged the book and yelled "Mom, look, it's the fairies!" She loved it! The pictures are wonderful and there are plenty to look at. Great book for little ones with imagination.

Another wonderful book and a real collectible. My daughter was overjoyed with receiving this for the holidays.

For all the planners out there, this is the book for you! I have just finished planning my family's first trip and can't imagine how I could have done it without the Passporter. This is a God-send! Don't go to Disney without it!!

If you're heading to Orlando then this book is a must. A friend recommended it and I promise you'll save 100x the cost of this book in $$$ savings and headaches.

When planning our trip I have bought just about every book I could find about Walt Disney World. I have to say that the Passporter is the best. They put just the right amount of information. I found the section called "Feasting" very helpful in choosing the restaurants for my family. Also, I like that it has places to write your itinerary and other info needed such as reservation numbers.

What a great way to get information and stay organized. Wish this book was available during the last 10 times, I've been to Walt Disney World. It's going to be a great collector's item for my kids. Keep in mind though that you may still need some of the other Walt Disney Books that are available. To list a few: Birnbaum's Walt Disney World Dining Guide, Birnbaum's Walt Disney World for Kids by Kids, Birnbaum's Walt Disney without Kids, Frommer's Walt Disney World & Orlando, The Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World and Walt Disney World Resort & Orlando. No matter how many times a person goes to Disney World there's still new information available that will save you lots of aggravation when you arrive in Orlando.

I was planning my family's first trip to Disney. I wanted to get the most out of our vacation, so I purchased 3 Disney travel books: Birnbaum's, The Unofficial Guide, and Passporter's. Passporter's was by far the best!!!!!! It has all the information you need about restaurants (good luck finding much information elsewhere!) and the maps were far superior to the ones handind out by Disney! I had to rip them out of the book to use them while we were in the parks because the Disney ones were hard to follow. It was a priceless addition that helped with our trip so much! Don't hesitate to buy!

Though Disney hasn't released the DVD yet, it has been released through affiliates who have links to disney.com. Search "Song of the South" on your web browser and you should come up with it. I think Disney is afraid to release it under their name, but are doing so undercover. I got one. The live scenes are a bit fuzzy, but not bad. The cartoon characters are clear and apparently were digitized. I doubt it will be on amazon for awhile as the sellers are few and want to maintain a higher price.

I am so glad I found this. Does anyone else think it's ironic that they changed the tar baby to a tar bunny?

What a treasure! Please release this wonderful film on DVD. It makes many important social comments & is very entertaining. This is one of Walt Disney's hidden treasures.

Please release Song of the South for all of us who remember seeing this movie as a child. I would love to share this movie with my child. It will always be one of my favorite movies. My mother, my sisters and myself going to see this movie is one childhood memory that I will always cherish. Please consider making this excellent movie available to us. Thank you!!

Song of the South is one of the most influential movies that I saw as a child. It shows us how to be happy in a lot of different situations. To have a positive attitude. The minority group should be very proud of this movie because the stories Uncle Remus told were positive reflections of life.
This day and age we need more old stories of being happy in tough times. Please release this movie. It is a part of history that should not be hidden.

This is one of those books I found as a child AFTER seeing the Disney movie and reading that it was based on a book. As usual, the book is so much better! If you've never read this book, but you're fond of the movie, or of dogs, you will love it. The story is truly heart-warming, and I love that certain scenes are oh-so familiar if you've seen the movie, but so much of the story is completely new! Did you know Perdita is NOT the name of the "leading lady"? That's all I'll say about the actual story, but please, read it for yourself, even if you don't have kids. It's a wonderful read-aloud book, too--the first time my husband ever heard about this book was when I made him lie down and let me read it to him. We didn't have a child then, so now we get to share it with our son, too. Truly, a wonderful book. However, just so you know--the second book is not nearly so good! I own both of them, but I probably won't read the second one more than one more time, when I read it to my son. It's just not at all the same thing--aliens in London? Anyway, read 101 Dalmations and I know you'll enjoy it!

I loved this book I read it when I was very young, I fell in love with it then, I lost the book and for years thought of getting it again. I feared that I would not like it as much, it was as I remembered, and not the Disney version. I still love the book it did not let let me down. It made me laugh, cry and now understand my dog a little more (ha ha)

I owned this book by Dodie Smith when I was a boy. I loved it and from this story I developed an even stronger love for dogs and animals in general. Written in a most loving way, the story takes us beyond the later Disney film's watered down presentation of the story and dives deep into the realm of dogs. We discover the magic of "dogdom" and how dogs of every kind communicate with each other and with their humans (as Dodie states, and I am certainly paraphrasing, dogs own their humans, but let them think they own the dogs because it is so sweet!)

I have only one complaint about this publication of the book. the illustrations are just short of atrocious. I had an earlier edition of the book that had wonderful drawings that clearly were created with a real understanding of the story and what Dodie was trying to say. The illustrations in this edition look like they were pulled from someone's generic dog clip art. They are technically fine in their own right (I could NEVER draw like that), but they just don't capture the magic of the book.

If you can look past the illustrations, this is a wonderful story and a well written book.

101 Dalmations has appeal to dog lovers of all ages, breeds and sizes.

Dodie Smith - Thanks for leaving this gem for all to share.

This is a charming and delightful book that is deserving of its status as a classic of children's literature.

It takes a dog's eye view of the world, and features as its heroes Pongo and Missis, a pair of Dalmatians whose litter of puppies disappears one day.

As they set off to reunite their family, they find themselves in a struggle against the illegal coat-making operation of one Cruella Deville, an iconic villainess whose name and passion for high temperatures hint that she may be the devil incarnate.

The book becomes a fantastic quest book that takes place in the heart of England. The adult dalmatians find friends and foes along their path, and end up liberating nearly a hundred little puppies.

Smith has fun with the details and logistics of feeding, disguising, and transporting the refugee puppies, and young readers will enjoy learning the particulars of the secret lives of dogs.

The original animated movie adaptation is a good and fairly faithful movie in its own right, but the book is better by far.

Some parents might shy away from the book because of the gruesome idea that Cruella literally skins her young charges, but I think that the darker elements are an integral part of the winning tone, which refrains from talking down to children.

Highly recommended!

I won my tattered, dog eared, Disyned-fied copy of "100 Dalmatians" in a school auction when I was 7 years old. I learned to read late because I'm dyslexic (hence any bad spelling you may notice) so this was the first real chapter book that I ever owned and the very first I read.

It was great. This is a fabulous novel for all ages but especially for kids. I'm not going to re-hash the plot because I think the whole world knows it by now. The themes of good parenting, loyalty, and of course, good, intelligent, kind dogs are things that every child should learn. It is true that this book contains some talk of puppy killing, which didn't disturb me, and I'm guessing that today's 7 year olds wouldn't be scared by it either.

Another reason to read, or let your child read this book is that it will encourage a love of dogs, and having grown up with dogs every minute of my life, I can tell you having one (or more) helps immensely in all kinds of situations, social and otherwise. It provides an example of love and loyalty, as well as the responsibility involved in feeding and caring for a dog. However on that note Dalmatians, contrary to the lovable Pongo, Missus and Perdita in this book, do not make good dogs for children. They don't have the temperament for it. If you read this book and decide to get a dog for your child (an excellent idea) I recommend a good old fashioned mutt (they're smarter because they're not inbred) or a border collie, which can actually be trained to be nannies for children because of their sheep herding instincts.

Anyway, five stars. Great for the whole family, and an excellent way to encourage reading in a child of any age. At 18 years old I still love reading this book. And the sequel, "The Twilight Barking" isn't half bad either.

Excellent pictures, interesting information. This is a must have for Disney fans of the Haunted Mansion! It even covers Disney's other haunted mansions around the world, and the Haunted Mansion movie. Everything you ever wanted to know!

THis book was great! A ton of information on the ride! I couldnt put it down! It was great.

This book is a must read for ALL ages and ANYONE interested in Disney theme park attractions around the globe. Any Disney fan knows that the Imagineers are very particular about what is revealed to the general public in terms of how they make their Disney 'magic' and I was pleasantly surprised (being an avid Disney fan myself) by the research that went into the making of this book and the amount of knowledge shared with the reader - it DOES in fact reveal some secrets of the mansion and never before seen history of the making of the attraction. (It confirms and dispels some rumors about the attraction once and for all too!) A pattern of discussion is followed throughout the book as you are verbally walked through the mansion's corridors and rooms. Surrell consistently covers the Haunted Mansion in a logical order (Disneyland, Walt Disney World, Tokyo Disneyland and Disneyland Paris) in every chapter. He takes the subject matter full circle by including information about how the attraction was translated to the big screen, and gives the reader insight to how decisions were made pertaining to set design, costume design, and casting for the movie of the same name. If you want an intelligent, thorough and enjoyable read about a classic Disney attraction, and especially an insight to the magic that is Imagineering, this is a MUST READ!

Lots o' great info on both the Ride @ the Disney Theme Parks + the Movie [which I loath - sorry but the Haunted Mansion wasn't meant to be made into a 2 hour episode of the Fresh Prince of Bellaire, mmmkay ?] + the Haunted Mansion Holiday ....

Future editions should drop all reference to the Movie, then spend more time on the Haunted Mansion Holiday [Nightmare Before Christmas Holiday makeover] + recent "changes" that occured in 2006 [I'd make it a 5 star if they did that] ....

If you don't want to read the book, please buy it for the artwork
[best priced Disney Merchandise vs. what you will pay @ the Theme Parks] ....

~(^)~

You buy this book thinking it's a great "behind-the-scenes" resource, but it's not. Yes, there is some background information, but the book skips confusingly from park to park, and offers very little technical information on the special effects. The photos are all standard Disney promotional stuff...this book tells you what Disney wants you to know, and nothing else.

Go to doombuggies.com for a much better treatment of this classic ride.