Exploring India’s most alluring region in greater detail even than the Rough Guide to India, the South India guide is the ultimate handbook to an absorbing world. In the south, the coconut groves seem greener and the rice paddies luminescent, people’s faces darker brown and the vermillion caste marks smeared on them arrestingly red. Southern India is one of the more relaxed, congenial parts of Asia to explore, and Rough Guides unswervingly points you in the right direction, whether you need a bus ticket to Ooty, an air-con room in Kovalam or advice about the Andamans.

Condé Nast Traveller: 'The bible for any visitor to India...contains more practical information than any other travel guide.' The Rough Guide to India is the essential handbook to this extraordinary country. Features include: • Full-colour section introducing India’s highlights. • In-depth accounts of every attraction, from fast-paced Delhi and the sacred sites of the Ganges plain to the Moghul splendour of Agra and the shell-sand beaches of the south. • Practical advice on activities as diverse as boating through the Keralan backwaters, hiking through the high-altitude deserts of Ladakh or treatments at an Áyurvedic spa. • Up-to-date reviews of the best places to stay and eat, for every budget. • Informed background on India’s history, politics, religions and music. • Maps and plans for every region.

DK's Eyewitness Travel Guides have increasingly become the most sought after guides by seasoned and novice travels alike. Featuring up-to-date information and spectacular 3-D aerial views -- all photographed in full-color -- each location is shown at its best. Recognized as the most unique and comprehensive travel guides on the market, Eyewitness Travel Guides create the new standard for travels. Every guide in the series is updated annually. 3-D aerial maps help you make the quickest journey from one place to the next. Red star sights help you get the most out of the shortest visit. Full-color photographs are taken specifically for each travel guide, and cut-away & floor plans present unique drawings of historic buildings and museums to show exactly where you are and what you see. All the sights in each area are described in depth with special keyed icons, and there's no need to buy an A-Z guide with our fully indexed street maps. Eat and shop with confidence with our reliable listings of hotels, restaurants, bars, and shops in all areas and at all prices. When it comes to entertainment, Eyewitness Travel Guides contains complete listings of theaters, music venues, cinemas, clubs, sports facilities, and activities for children. A special survival guide shows you how to use local currency, public transportation and telephones through pictures.

'A thoughtful anthology… a true insight into modern India from both inside and out'

Special features include objective recommendations of where to stay - from Maharajas' palaces to rustic beaches and 1001 ways to get off the beaten track together with insights into Indian culture.

Eternal Triangle
If you really want to get a true taste of what to expect on a forthcoming visit to the area, buy this book. With its colourful photos, maps, and diagrams it will not only whet your appetite, but provide a truly accurate and vivid picture of what's in store and allow you to plan trips and visits with confidence and anticipation.

Highly recommended
Louis Fischer does his subject justice with a fine account of Gandhi's life. Despite the long duration of the Mahatma's struggle, the author keeps the book interesting pretty much throughout. Fischer's two first hand accounts of his meetings with Gandhi serve as a plesent break in the course of the book, giving it greater life, as well as providing a more personal insight into Gandhi.

Our Bible !
I studied the guide before our holiday but read it from cover to cover whilst we were there.The reviews of the restaurants were extremely accurate and from the guide we discovered many of the Goa's beautiful restaurants which we would never have found otherwise. The reviews on temples was also extremely useful and explained in great detail what you would find around the temple areas and also inside the temples. All in all, I personally wouldn't travel to Goa without it.

Many interesting places, even palaces
Sawday's collection of places to stay will provide you with many unusual and I would guess often fascinating places to stay (not having had the opportunity to sample them all). Many feature smaller upmarket guest houses (or something in that tradition). In such cases you may well be living with the local family (in what looks like great luxury). There are also hotels, eco-resorts and other style places though.