Cristian Bonetto is an Australian travel writer, by his own description a reformed playwright and TV soap writer, whose earlier scripts for the screen gave way to a career penning more than fifty travel guidebooks.
Based in Melbourne, with family roots in Italy's Veneto, he has become one of Lonely Planet's most seasoned voices on Italy, covering the country's flagship guide alongside city and regional titles for Rome, Venice, Naples and the Amalfi Coast, with further beats stretching from Copenhagen and New York to Singapore and his home turf of Queensland. His work has also appeared in the Telegraph and other travel publications internationally.
Discover Italy distils his specialist subject into a highlights-led planner, steering travellers from chariot-grooved streets in Pompeii to Tuscan wine country and the Trevi Fountain.
What sets his writing apart is unabashed appetite, a self-declared glutton and bon vivant, and a feel for the visceral: asked what he loves about Naples, his adopted specialist city, he points to its electric energy, its temperament, and the perspective that comes from living in the shadow of a volcano.
He considers shining a spotlight on passionate locals, the guides, artists and cooks who make a place, one of the great privileges of the job.
