Directional Sense:
How to Find Your Way Around
by Janet R. Carpman and Myron A. Grant
Published by Institute for Human Centered Design, 2012
www.directionalsense.com
Winner (Self-help)
National Indie Excellence Awards (2013)

Winner (Self-help)
Next Generation Indie Book Awards (2013)

Overview
Were you born with no sense of direction? Does the mere thought of navigating twisting hospital corridors, deciphering cryptic expressway signs, or fumbling with cumbersome maps fill your heart with dread? If so, you need this trusty guidebook, which explains that finding your way around is a learnable skill, not a mysterious instinct you’re doomed to live without.
A lighthearted introduction to the ins and outs of wayfinding, it provides step-by-step guides to following signs, reading maps, recognizing landmarks, using GPS devices, and more. Along with anecdotes describing how everyone gets lost at times, and photos showing how being turned around is not always your fault, Directional Sense offers a wealth of practical advice to help you confidently get from here to there and back!
Reviews & Blurbs
Carpman Grant AssociatesIn a work that is timely, well organized, clearly articulated, and vividly illustrated, professional wayfinding consultants Janet Carpman and Myron Grant offer a step-by-step, easy-to-use book on directional planning for people who want to maintain and gain navigational independence. This helpful volume will be an asset to readers of all ages, abilities, and challenges who want to successfully find their way to, from, and around all kinds of places and environments… It is a highly recommended educational and practical resource for all ages.
– Pamela Kaiser, ForeWord Reviews
Carpman Grant AssociatesEveryone who has ever been late for an appointment, missed a flight, or stood up a date because they lost their way will find both solace and instruction in this terrific book. It’s chock full of fascinating facts, amusing stories, and practical information to help wayward travelers of all stripes.
– Colin Ellard, author of You Are Here: Why We Can Find Our Way to the Moon, but Get Lost in the Mall
Carpman Grant AssociatesIn easy-to-follow chapters, the authors reassure the reader that everyone gets lost and explain how to decipher numbers and words, how to read maps and follow signs, how to recognize landmarks and how to ask directions and re-ask them if need be. . . Directional Sense: How to Find Your Way Around could easily be a text for classroom use. It is well-written, well-organized and highly useful for all readers. Sooner or later, someone will visit a city or an area and wish they had this book in their backpack. . . [It] should be a classroom must for schools everywhere.
– Five Star Review from Readers' Favorite
Carpman Grant AssociatesFor directionally challenged people, this book shows not only the light at the end of the tunnel, but how to get to and through the tunnel itself.
– Richard Saul Wurman, Founder of TED Conferences, author of Information Anxiety
Carpman Grant AssociatesLo and behold, we directionally challenged people (and there are many of us) can learn wayfinding skills – with a little practice – and gain more control in unfamiliar places. It’s a big, complex world out there, but this book helps us take heart and find our way through it.
– Rebecca Kilgore, jazz vocalist, and frequent traveler
Carpman Grant AssociatesIn highlighting the interdependence of maps, signage, and spatial planning, this book has priceless insights for architects, interior designers, and mapmakers. It’s also a fascinating read for travelers and others who routinely navigate unfamiliar landscapes, indoors or out. A comprehensive (and subtly subversive) guide to design flaws and their consequences, it challenges the perpetrators to shape up or get lost.
– Mark Monmonier, author of How to Lie with Maps