What Every American Should Know about Europe: The Hot Spots, Hotshots, Political Muck-Ups, Cross-Border Sniping, and Cultural Chaos of Our Transatlant

In her latest, well-informed author and Ohio native Rossi (What Every American Should Know About the Rest of the World) might be writing an irreverant ""Cliff's Notes"" for American geography students who have difficulty finding Europe on a map, were it not for her opinionated voice and her commitment to ""European history and culture that we rarely learn in school."" Deliberately playing to the Ugly American vantage point, Rossi divides the book into two parts, ""Old Europe"" and ""New Europe,"" though, in characteristic fashion, she efficiently delineates the real-world differences between ""Western Europe and Greece"" (the Old) and the largely post-Communist eastern counterparts (the New) without losing her playful attitude. In 28 entries, Rossi has created an engaging travel guide complete with the basics-demographics, history, hot spots and notable natives-as well as numerous digressions, including the significance of Ireland's groundbreaking television comedy Father Ted; Poland's answer to the Olsen twins, actors-turned-moral crusaders the Kaczynski twins; and Sweden's innovative use of booze and manure for fuel. Rossi is most skilled in keeping her guide balanced: sidebar stories on significant events, scandals and achievements add depth and definition to each profile, while the one-line summaries included in the introductions (""France: Most Land, most pushy, biggest food producer"") keep things pithy.