A nice but slightly over priced nostalgia piece on San Francisco History via the life and times of Herb during the late 30's to the 90's. What many fans of Herb Caen are waiting for is a collection of all the Caen columns written from 1938-97. It will become the most relevant history and literature piece available on San Francisco ever published since the gigantic Bancroft efforts on California history of the last century.

I agree with the previous reviewer, it is a little light on content and a little expensive. But, it is a good coffee table book that does capture the feel of The City from the wonderful perspective of Mr. Caen. I'd recommend it to anyone who loves the city and might want to show it off to others who are not familiar with Herb or the atmosphere of San Francisco. It is not a good travel book or book for tourists. It does have some items of historical interest in the photos and text. The price on Amazon is good. I saw it for $35.00 at the B&N near me. END

We thought this book would be a great way to research riding vacations.
We naiively took the descriptions as accurate and ended up stranded far from home in what was basically a dirty PIT, literally inhabited by individuals convicted of crimes and again in trouble with the law during our stay. It was a most bizarre, horrible environment and experience. Luckily the weather was good, so we managed by avoiding the "resort" every day and also avoiding the staff as much as possible. (They were very inattentive anyway, beginning the first day, when they forgot to pick us up.)
Afterward, we noticed some fine print on the inside cover of this book: "The information in this book has been provided by the ranches themselves . . . . The auther and publisher make no representation that this book is absolutely accurate or complete. All ranches are included without charge to them." Consider this a big red flag!!! We will NEVER take the chance of going somewhere we have read about only in this book again.