Toronto: The Essential Guide to the Best of the City.

Janet Arnett is the former campus manager of adult education at Ontario’s Georgian College. She is the author of Antiques and Collectibles: Starting Small, The Grange at Knock, and 673 Ways to Save Money.

You’ll find all the traditional travel guide stuff here: information on attractions, restaurants, hotels, parks, shopping, entertainment, etc. However, this is not your typical tourist guide, and it is definitely not the best guide to give Great Aunt Mildred when she visits T.O. Unless, of course, the great auntie is gay, likes to visit head shops or bath houses, would enjoy contacting local fetish groups or shopping for “adult products.” Oh, and provided she doesn’t object to the f-word in her tourist lit prose.

Once past these innovations, the guide provides a very thorough introduction to the restaurants, bars, patios, entertainment spots, dance clubs, film festivals, theatres, and galleries that fill the city. The organization is by area (“nabes”): downtown, midtown, east, west, north. The entry for each establishment includes address, phone number, website, and a very readable, informal, chatty review. For restaurants an icon indicates NOW magazine recommendations, and dollar signs are used as a code to indicate approximate price range. The generous restaurant section is the strength of the work, with groupings by type (Persian, vegetarian, seafood, etc.) and lots of creative sidebars: top five late-night nosheries; top five dim sum; top five places to avoid, and many, many more. Although somewhat overshadowed by the strong restaurant section, sightseeing, shopping, sports and recreation, hotels, hostels, and services (shoe repair to tattoos) all receive lots of listings, again sorted by neighbourhood and complete with full contact information and lively reviews. All this follows a not-to-be-missed two-page history lesson.

A generous scattering of colour photos, exceptionally clear maps, a “yellow pages” resource section (transit, transportation, holidays, weather, crisis lines, religious and cultural organizations, medical and emergency services), colour-coded section tabs, and a detailed index all contribute to the attractiveness and usefulness of the guide. The creative prose makes reading the entries fun. Overall, it is a great resource for liberal-thinking residents as well as visitors.