The Hidden Mouse

There's another guide book (The Hidden Mouse, paperback 118 pgs) available about the Hidden Mickeys of the Disneyland Resort. For those of you who do not know about this phenomenon, Disney Imagineers often place a silhouette of Mickey's head within an attraction or elsewhere in the Disney Parks. The majority of the hidden Mickeys take the shape of three circles. A larger circle for the head and two smaller circles for the ears. What makes tracking down hidden Mickeys difficult is that they are often in places or areas that are not easily visible and Disney has no official list of where they are located. Documentation and cataloguing are left up to the fans.

The Hidden Mouse is not the first book to catalogue Hidden Mickeys. Stephen Barrett's Hidden Mickey's has been out for a number of years and has gone through several editions and covers multiple parks. So, since we have two books covering virtually the same subject, a side by side comparison is in order.

Page Count: Hidden Mickeys - 96 pgs; Hidden Mouse - 118 pgs (both books are in paperback)

Photos: Hidden Mickeys - none; Hidden Mouse - at least one color photo per page

Coverage: Both books cover Disneyland, DCA, Downtown Disney and Park Hotels

Writing Style: Barrett's Hidden Mickey's is written as a scavenger hunt leading you on a path through each land. This book reads better if you're standing in Disneyland. Joyce's Hidden Mouse is written in an informative style. He also includes some hidden Mickeys that probably should not be included and gives well thought-out reasoning why. Joyce also includes trivia about attractions.

It'll probably come down to readers choice on which book to buy, but I tended to enjoy The Hidden Mouse better due to the photos.

Three New Disneyland Books

Greetings everyone. I just got back from a trip to Disneyland which was all decorated for Halloween. The Halloween Screams fireworks show was the best pyrotechnic display since the 50th celebration, but the Ghost Galaxy overlay on Space Mountain was just so-so. Anyway, I picked up three new books.

The first is Disneyland Challenge (seen above). This spiral-bound paperback book comes in at 128 pages. It's part guidebook and part trivia challenge. It's an interesting read but I feel that the Imagineering Field Guide to Disneyland is a better book.

Next up is Finding Nemo in the Disney Theme Parks. This was an interesting concept. The authors go from Park to Park to see how the characters from Finding Nemo are used in attractions. (paperback; 24 pages)

And, finally we have Windows On Main Street (paperback; 24 pages). A book that is long overdue. As any Disney fan knows, those names that appear on the windows of the shops on Main St. are real people. Quite often the description features a play on words or a personal hobby of the person being inshrined. This book contains photos of the windows and description of the persons contribution to Disney and the story behind the window. The back of the book also contains a map of Disneyland and Walt Disney World where each window is located. But, on the downside, the book is incomplete. The map lists 63 different windows at Disneyland, but the book only details about half of those. (An even worse ratio for Walt Disney World.) Also, the photo quality of the windows is horrible. Quite often there is shadow or glare across the window so the description is not readable.