Latest news and information from Sunflower Books
Up to 2007, Sunflower Books published a printed catalogue every year which was available on request. However, demand for the printed catalogue has diminished to the point where incurring the cost of printing it in addition to running our web site is no longer viable. Accordingly, therefore, from now on our "catalogue" will only be available online. This web site contains all the information we ever provided in our catalogue (and much more!). However, for the benefit of customers who wish to have in printed form details of what we are currently publishing, we are providing a handy A4 size Book List in pdf format which is easily downloaded and viewed on your monitor or printed out. The 2008 Book List highlights all new books and new editions that are currently available, shows UK bookshop and mail order prices for every book and includes details of how to obtain the books in ebook form. You'll need Adobe Acrobat Reader software (version 3 or higher) to download the Book List. This normally comes as standard on most computers, but if you do not already possess it, you can download it free of charge at http://www.adobe-download-now.com To access the Book List download, please click here

Refer to the Destinations page to access extensive information about all the guides published by Sunflower. (This includes publications that will not appear until later in the year - such titles are not included in the Book List.)

Use the "Availability" link to check whether the book you want is readily available.

Reminder - how to order
Sunflower Books offers five options for ordering (and in addition you also have the option to order from Amazon.co.uk on each book page).
1. You can print out an order form or use the order form included in our catalogue to send us your order by post, enclosing payment by cheque (or just write a letter saying what you require).
2. You can use the online order facility direct from this web site. Please be aware that online orders for English language versions are processed for us by our leading stockholders The Map Shop at Upton upon Severn. If you place an online order and subsequently wish to amend or cancel it, do NOT contact Sunflower Books, as we will have no record of your order. Contact the Map Shop (telephone and fax numbers shown in items 3 and 4 below or e-mail themapshop@btinternet.com).
3. Order by telephone from our stock holder The Map Shop (Freephone - 0800 085 4080), who process telephone orders for us.
4. Order by fax (also processed for us by the Map Shop) Fax number 01684 594559
5. For many of our titles you can order ebooks in Adobe Acrobat pdf format direct from Sunflower - see next item.

Sunflower titles are now available as Ebooks
Although most people prefer to purchase walking guides in printed book form, some users have expressed the wish that our books are available in e-book form. (An e-book is a book that is available in electronic format. Various formats are used, but one of the most popular is Adobe Acrobat, since the pdf files produced by this software can be viewed on virtually any computer, including laptops.) Virtually all of our titles are available as ebooks - there are just a few that for technical reasons we are unable to offer in pdf form, (for example the two Channel Islands books Guernsey and Jersey are not available in ebook form). Ordering is easy - choose the destination page then just click on the ebook link to be taken to a form where you can order using your credit or debit card. (If no link is shown, that title is not available as an ebook.) After you've placed your order, following checking of your card details, we e-mail you instructions on how to download the pdf file for your chosen guidebook onto your computer. As long as you have Adobe Acrobat Reader version 3 or later on your machine, you will be able to view the book immediately. (Adobe Acrobat software comes as standard with many computers but if you don't already have it you can download it free of charge from www.Adobe-Reader.co.uk)
Ebooks have certain advantages:
1. They are available immediately - no waiting for the post. Provided you order before 15.00hrs on any working day, we will normally be able to e-mail you instructions for downloading the same day - and in any case within 24 hours.
2. You can if you wish print out selected pages (for example just half a dozen walks you plan to do) or the entire book. Moreover, if you prefer to print pages in a larger size than our normal size (21cm for Landscapes books and 15cm for Walk & Eat titles) you can do so. All maps are included in high-definition so that within reason there is no limit to the size you can print them - especially useful if your sight is not as good as it could be.
3. If you want to find the place in a book where a particular item or location is mentioned or described, Acrobat will search the entire text within a couple of seconds and take you to the appropriate page.

IMPORTANT NOTE Please be aware that most Ebooks are between 10MB and 12MB in size, but they can be up to 25MB in size, depending on the number of illustrations in the book (for example most books in the Walk & Eat series are around 22MB in size). It is therefore essential that you have a broadband connection. Your card is debited as soon as the book you have ordered has been e-mailed, so please do not order if you only have a dial-up connection - downloading of a large file could easily fail. Once we receive and process your order, no refunds can be made if your connection proves to be incapable of receiving the pdf file.

Photo Gallery
Not sure of where you'd like to walk for your next holiday? Help make up your mind by checking out the scenery on some of our most popular titles by browsing through our gallery of photographs. When you see something that appeals to you, have a look at the page for the destination to find out the best times of year to visit, also for advice on where to stay. Click here to visit the photo gallery, or click to visit it when you are on the destination page of your choice.

Check the Contents and Index of any of our Landscapes guides
We often receive enquiries from users asking us "Does the book cover such and such a resort?" or "In which areas are the walks?". We have added to the web page for each available destination a link to the contents page and index page of the book which will enable you to check exactly what is included.

Upgrade your Landscapes guide at half price!
It's a false economy to use an out of date edition because so many things can change within a short while. Although new editions may sometimes appear to be pretty much the same as the previous edition, there are always scores of alterations to the walk and car tour descriptions. (We only publish new editions when there are sufficient changes to make it ESSENTIAL to replace the existing edition.) However, we realise many users are reluctant to pay out for another guide when the one they possess may have been purchased only a year or a couple of years ago. As a special concession to our loyal users of Landscapes guides, we have therefore introduced a concessionary UPGRADE service - click here for details.

Our own search facility
This web site continues to grow in size and it's always possible for a visitor to miss the very item he or she might want to see. Our search engine will instantly find for you all pages with a reference to what you are seeking. Suppose, for instance you want to receive a book extra fast, if you key in "quicker delivery" it will tell you the page that gives expedited delivery options. Click here to try it out (or you can access it from our home page by clicking on "Search"). For your convenience, in addition to providing a rapid search of our site, there is also the option to switch to a search of the entire web.

Number of walks in each book - a clarification
Throughout this web site, for each title we list the number of walks, car tours and picnics in the book. Please note that the number of walks shown in the contents is deceptive. For instance, "Landscapes of Madeira" lists only 41 main walks, whereas there are OVER 100 DIFFERENT routes in the book. Some guide books describe shorter walks and suggest that you combine them. We have traditionally listed long walks and broken them down into smaller stretches. We feel that this allows us to 1) fit much more material into the books and 2) combine walking maps to give a better overall view. As one user wrote about "La Palma and El Hierro", "you seem to sell yourselves short on your contents page, listing only 20 walks. I counted 50!"

Out of print titles
If a bookseller tells you one of our titles is unobtainable or out of stock, it may be due to the fact that we have decided not to reprint the current edition because a new edition is in preparation. (Were we to reprint the old edition when a new edition is imminent, it's likely we would have a lot of unsaleable books left on our hands as soon as the new edition was printed.) However, should you be told one of our titles is out of print, if you will be holidaying before the new edition is likely to be available, don't give up. Firstly, even though it may not be possible for your usual retailer to order a copy for you, you may be able to find another bookseller who has still got a copy in stock. Secondly, when a book is temporarily going out of print, Sunflower tries to hold back sufficient stock of the existing edition for our mail order service, to enable us to meet orders for the current edition until the new edition becomes available. So books are sometimes available from Sunflower even if our trade distributors have exhausted their stock. In such instances, books are not available via the online option - they must be ordered by post and paid for by cheque. The address to use is Sunflower Books, PO Box 115, Exeter EX2 6YU.

However, the following Landscapes titles are now out of print and we have made a decision not to issue new editions of them. If you are seeking any of these destinations, unless you find a bookshop that happens still to have the book you require in stock, your only option is to ask your local library to try to locate a copy via the inter-library loan service.

Brittany, Cataluna, Portugal Estoril, Sintra & Cascais, Portugal Costa Verde (but for Portugal see current title Northern Portugal also Walk&Eat Lisbon); Rhodes, (but we now offer Walk & Eat Rhodes);Turkey: Bodrum & Marmaris, Turkey: Around Antalya (but forTurkey see the Sunflower Complete series, three titles in which cover all the resorts on the Turkish coast from Bodrum to Antalya)

The position regarding editions in languages other than English is often different. Always check the Language Editions page to determine whether a French, Dutch or German edition is available. You should also be aware that whilst new editions of books are always published in English, for various reasons it is not always practicable to publish a new edition in the other languages.

A warning - don't be tempted to pick plants
Recently we were told by a walker that he had picked a plant on Tenerife to the horror of locals who told him it was toxic. He thought we ought to identify all toxic plants in our books. In the event the two toxic plants he mentioned on Tenerife are huge plants (tabaiba and cardon), and cutting stems off this type of plant is simply vandalism. In fact throughout most of Europe it is now ILLEGAL to pick plants. The country codes in all our books remind you politely NOT to pick plants; please leave the countryside for others to enjoy. At the same time, you may be protecting yourself from harm.

And while on the subject of plants ...
Users sometimes complain to us that they've found a path included in a walk to be badly overgrown (and in a few cases virtually impassable). But please realise that if you encounter a path that has not been maintained, it's not our fault - the route was clear and easy to use when the author researched the book. In some locations, the local authorities or forestry controllers ensure that routes are kept clear, but this is not so in every destination. And as any gardener will know, plants can grow incredibly quickly, especially if there has been a rainy spell, so if you come across a path which is no longer usable, do let us know and we will include a note to that effect in the Update for the book.

SPAM e-mails
Like many businesses, we get a massive amount of junk e-mail every day. We use filtering software that removes all the junk - we don't even see it. The software is incredibly effective at identifying spam whilst allowing through bona fide messages. Just occasionally, however, a customer who e-mails us unwittingly uses a heading or includes content in his/her message that flags the software to identify it as junk mail. If at any time you e-mail us at mail@sunflowerbooks.co.uk and fail to receive a reply within 48 hours, your message probably got rejected. To be absolutely sure that your message will reach us, click here to access our secure e-mail option.