Why’s it so hard to find a Rick Steves book in Barcelona?!

You can download it onto your device. I have the Barcelona book in my kindle that I use on my phone with the Kindle app. My edition is 10 years old, but I still got some info from it while there a week ago. Yours will be new and up-to-date.

Rick Steves is virtually unknown outside of the US and his books are aimed at the American market hence why you won't find them readily available in Europe. The likes of Lonely Planet, Rough Guide et al are widely known and are generally the "go to" travel guides for most Europeans.

I have found them in hotel lobby bookshelves in hotels where his tour groups have stayed. In May, we were in Rome at the Hotel Smeraldo. A group was just ending their stay there and I found 3 different versions of his Rome/Italy books.
If any one knows which hotel in Barcelona they frequent maybe they can let you know. Of maybe email the RS office.

Yes by all means buy the e-book. Problem solved!

Yep he’s not known outside of the US. I have never seen one of his books here in England either.

I live in Germany too and have never seen his books in the large bookstore in Frankfurt which has a huge English language section. You just won't find his books overseas.

While it's true you won't find the books, as far as I know, in a bookstore (not that I've looked) the library service has them. My own, Cumbria Libraries (the Lake District), has 9 of them- Greece, Belgium, Barcelona, Croatia/Slovenia, Ireland, France, Spain, Scottish Highlands and Warsaw/Krakow/Gdansk.

And they are in demand, frequently out on loan. The Scottish Highlands one for instance is on loan now. Last time I needed one (as identification to meet someone) I couldn't get the one in my local library (Ireland) as it was on constant loan (with a waiting list)- I had to ILL another from one of the other libraries in the County.

I admit to wondering why someone in the UK would want an American take on the Scottish Highlands, but there you are.

Historically we will have acquired them because someone asked the Library service if they could buy the book for them- that is usually how such eclectic acquisitions come to be made.

I never did follow through later and get hold of the Ireland book to see what it said.

Maybe the locals want to read an “exotic” point of view.
I’ve never seen any of his books in an English-language bookstore here in France.

A few years ago I did see them in Stanfords, the travel bookshop in Covent Garden. That is to be expected, as a travel bookshop in Covent shop it will have a very comprehensive range.
Outside of specialist shops like this I really wouldn’t expect to see them. They are produced by an American company for a specific American market.

Thanks for the feedback everyone. I’ll just say obviously he’s writing for an American audience, and therefore wouldn’t expect to find him in your usual bookstore. But as (I think) the best selling travel guide in the US, I’m still surprised to find NONE selling his book, especially in such a tourist zone as Barcelona, at book stores that claim to have an especially large English language section or specialize in travel guides. The stores I looked at had other English language BCN books as well („Hidden Barcelona“, etc.). I wouldn’t at all call Rick niche, or think your average English speaking global traveler would find his US perspective totally foreign or useless. Anyways, I was happy to find his book on Florence IN Florence a few months ago, pretty much right out of the train station, at a large book store. I had his Italy book with me on the trip but was looking for Florence and Tuscany specifically. You win some you lose some I guess.

A few very large branches of Waterstones particularly in London such as the one in Piccadilly do stock Rick Steve's books and they have a comprehensive range online.

I think a European traveller could find many useful things in an RS book. However, the overall tone is jarring for people who have travelled to other parts of Europe regularly since they were babes in arms and don’t see it as being much of a big deal. I’m thinking about the scam warnings, money belts and that kind of thing. The books are also quite prescriptive and again if you’re used to going on holiday abroad frequently, you’re probably not looking for an itinerary in that way.

That’s not to say the books are bad at all for their target market. If I was going to somewhere unfamiliar I would find a similar guide book comforting.

^^^ this.

I love Rick and his travel philosophy, and I appreciate him provided training wheels and inspiration for my early trips, but I agree with everything here. I think Rick would probably agree that he writes with a particular target market in mind and uses a particular "voice" to simplify the process for that audience.

He doesn't have a European publisher so all the prices for things are in US Dollars. Any of Rick's books you may see in European bookshops are US editions, imported in very small numbers at considerable expense I'd imagine.

Ricks book found in Barcelona: https://blog.ricksteves.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/DSCN2797.jpg

Ricks book found in Barcelona

That's Rick's copy though. It doesn't count when he brings his own book for people to pose for his blog with :)

I do see the point (“Chris,” about four comments above) regarding the “particular voice” Mr. Steves uses “to simplify the process for [his] audience.” Though I don’t use his guidebooks, I do recall that when speaking with a vintner on one of his France television episodes, he asked her what she meant by “terroir.” Now I can’t imagine that Mr. Steves needed to be told what the French mean by “terroir” — rather, I’m sure he just assumed that his target audience (which several respondents have already identified) had to be told. He could, after all, have phrased his question less disingenuously, as “Could you explain to my American viewers what ‘terroir’ is?”

And yes, if that is the kind of “voice” that comes through his guidebooks, I can understand why Europeans would not be interested in them.

I think you might be surprised at how many Americans have never heard of RS.

I had never heard of him until 2007 when my M-i-L came to visit and had his book. She insisted on seeing the RLD, which shocked me. Why would he put that in his guide book? (I still don't know, as this is not his demographic) I found a ton of errors in the book, and I wondered why he doesn't have staff validate what he writes? I used to be on Fodors and they trashed him all the time for his errors, on cities all over Europe. So, I can see why residents of Europe would not want his book. Perhaps they picked it up, laughed at what he wrote and put it back on the shelf, or the book stores did the same? I have ordered his book a few times at our large book store. I think it ran me about 16€?

I understand how that fake rube act may seem like disingenuousness, but it’s a really good technique for engaging an audience.

He’s trying to get folks who “dream of going to Europe someday” to actually work up the courage and do it. So. In that example about terroir, he inserts himself into the frame as a fellow traveler rather than the “expert”. He’s your knowledgeable buddy who’s helping you plan your trip. In our culture, we increasingly don’t love “experts”, whereas your buddy who knows about travel is awesome. To a German that idea probably seems bonkers

You have to remember that the whole reason for Rick doing this was to preach independent international travel to a country where it’s largely not a thing. Still, decades later that hasn’t changed. When Americans do travel, it’s domestic, a cruise or an all-inclusive where they never leave a curated experience.

50% of Americans don’t have a passport
42% have never left the country
70% have never left North America/caribbean
24% never plan on leaving the country.

Those PBS shows have launched millions of travelers on their first independent Europe trip. And the next time Sue or Sam have a glass of wine with their friends, maybe they mention the concept of terroir… and maybe that leads to talking about travel and going to France someday.

You can get RS books in these shops in Barcelona, something else is that sometimes you need to order it (among other things because it's a bit weird to purchase a travel guide about Barcelona "in" Barcelona, that's not how most of us work -at least here in Europe-, one tends to buy the book "before" reaching destination)

https://www.altair.es/cat/
https://www.fnac.es/
https://www.casadellibro.com/
https://www.alibri.cat/

Christ (a couple comments above): You make good points, and I'm not going to say much more, for after all, this forum may not be the proper venue for me to dwell much further on my thoughts; but I'll add a couple of seemingly "safe" points:

First, I’ll state briefly that I have my own, rather different and more demanding ideas of what independent travel looks like — which, of course, every independent traveller does — though as this is Mr. Steves’ forum, and not mine, I won’t dwell on the matter further.

But second, and more fundamentally, I’ve never been impressed with dishonesty of any variety, and I’ll admit to being a little "turned off” when the head of a successful Europe-oriented tourism corporation (deservedly successful, I’ll admit) poses as a common “rube” tourist. I’m willing to respect all travellers who themselves travel respectfully (as of course Mr. Steves does, and with an admirable travel philosophy, as you pointed out yourself); it’s just that I feel rather “unimpressed” when, for example, a corporate CEO refers to his local travel companion as “my fellow tour guide”!

And as a final thought, which may be seem a tad self-centered, I’ll acknowledge that while Mr. Steves has indeed done a remarkably successful job of getting otherwise reluctant Americans to visit Europe in his semi-independent way, I would probably enjoy European travel a lot more, if he hadn’t!

I’ll admit to being a little "turned off” when the head of a successful Europe-oriented tourism corporation (deservedly successful, I’ll admit) poses as a common “rube” tourist.

It's not specific to RIck. It's just a common journalistic technique. If one is interviewing an expert, whether it be about glass blowing, making paella or the history of windmills, you're not going to get the best information for your reader or audience if you're an "expert" on the subject too. The interviewer must have (or feign) a degree of ignorance to leave space for the real expert to share the knowledge they have. People like to tell you something they think you don't know. Journalism 101.

edit: Chris said much the same thing further up actually now I've scrolled.

Thank you for mentioning RS Ebooks, I hadn't thought of that.

I can download ebooks for free from 7 libraries in my state, so I searched them. A few of them had a number of Rick Steves guidebooks for many countries, available for download, but they were all published in 2013. So I wasn't interested. I did download "On the Hippie Trail", I think that will be an interesting insight into this RS thing.

So I went to: https://store.ricksteves.com/collections/guidebooks
And found the Barcelona ebook for $21.99. I also see that it's publication date is May 2026. So if you happen upon a RS book on Barcelona in a bookstore, be sure to check the publication data.

GerryM: Having majored in math in college, I appreciated your brief insights into the course-content of Journalism 101! No wonder the journalism majors among my friends always seemed so sly.

Anyway, among my travels, and mainly in museums and sites where on-site guides are required, I have sometimes listened to guides telling me things I already knew. in those cases I neither cut them off by telling them that I already knew these things, nor did I pretend to be hearing these for the first time. Rather, I just listened carefully and allowed them to talk. On some occasions I found legitimate questions to ask without revealing that I already knew the bare facts; and on others I found that the local interpretations of things were interesting, simply because I knew those facts.

Of course, none of those occasions was being filmed for wider audiences. But had they been, I still feel, very strongly, that I would have found a way of getting, from those guides, the information my audiences required, without pretending to be someone I was not. I'll allow journalists and lawyers to be tricky when trying to get a corrupt politician to mention the public funds he had stolen; otherwise I want only honesty.

Having majored in math in college, I appreciated your brief insights into the course-content of Journalism 101! No wonder the journalism majors among my friends always seemed so sly.

Yeah... sly is certainly one way of describing it if that's what it looks like to you. I'm sure your friends would love to know they're being described in such terms

My degree is from the school of hard knocks, university of life. That's where I did my masters too. I'd have thought what I said was common sense rather than anything based on course content.

Christ (a couple comments above):

That's quite a promotion you've given me, but alas I'm just a simple traveler. If I have saved anything, it's a bit of time, money and hassle for people visiting this board. 😄

While Rick doesn't talk down to his audience, I have to disagree that he "poses as a rube." He puts a great deal more history and art into his shows than is typical of other TV travel hosts, for example, and his genuine knowledge and appreciation of those aspects of European culture are apparent from his presentation.

I tend to think most people would disagree with the observation that Rick Steves poses as a rube.

While I understand that he comes across as earnest and maybe "dorky" to some, I would think the funny and provocative commentary that he's purposefully poising as a simpleton in some sort of maneuver to maximize his profits as kind of risible.

Recently, I saw the movie The Odyssey. While the reviews have been mostly positive, some have been particularly smart and critical. It is kind of amazing that some witty, urbane, educated and thoughtful critics can laud the work while others find it dreadful. I would use the blind men touching parts of an elephant but frankly that analogy doesn't work here-- and if I did, I might come across as "earnest" and "dorky".

Hey, I like Rick Steves. My wife always said he is kind of a "goober"-- not sure what that means. But hey we are what others see us as, aren't we? Anyway, his tours are awesome and I like his guides and tv shows. It think if he wrote a guild to Cleveland however I would find his manner off-putting. (We are touchy lot here in Cleveland.)

Keep on travelin'