Product Description
Learn Italian step-by-step and soon you’ll be making leaps and bounds Your quickest route to learning Italian is through a solid grounding in grammar basics. Now don’t be put off by the “G-word. ” What you won’t find in this book is a lot of repetitive drills. Instead, you get an original, step-by-step approach to learning Italian based on the way people naturally acquire language. From the very beginning, you are introduced to the most essentia. . . More >>
This is an excellent book for anyone wishing to learn Italian or those of us who already have a foundation in the language. The book starts off with the basics of Italian and slowly builds on complexity and difficulty. The author breaks the grammar down into small, manageable sections – each section filled with reading comprehension (you read a short story that is accompanied with vocabulary and exercises to test your understanding of the stories) as well as exercises to test your understanding of the grammar. The author also peppers the chapters with useful “asides” which are noted in the chapters by “thumbtacks” which help to remind students of particular grammar points or to follow up with further clarification.
Some of the best chapters are on: present subjunctive; use of the verb, piacere; indirect and direct objects; telling time; numbers, dates, calendar; reflexive verbs; prepositions; and negatives.
I find this book to be very versatile and use it as a desk reference when I have a question about a particular grammar point. I have gone through the book myself, refreshing and brushing up on all the grammar topics and have found that I have even learned some new things. Even students who are more advanced can find a use for a book such as this.
Beginners will find this book to be extremely useful. Students with some knowledge of Italian can also benefit from this book to help fill in the gaps and eliminate any grammatical weaknesses. This book is a great buy — another great work by this author!
(NB: I agree with the other reviewer that you should supplement this book with some kind of aural practice, such as Pimsleur CD’s, one of my favorites, Oxford Take Off In Italian (Oxford Take Off in Language Learning Kits) from Oxford University Press)
Rating: 5 / 5
I’ve been pleasantly surprised with this book since it is different from other language books I’ve tried. I’m looking for the basics to be able to communicate during trips and appreciate the approach this book takes in starting right out with some grammatical information, not just standard tourist phrases. If you’re lucky enough to have an ear for the language and can speak understandably, the locals are inclined to think you are fluent and answer accordingly. I’ve had that happen on more than one occasion and then am out of luck since I can’t understand them. By having some better knowledge of the language patterns, such as basic grammar and idioms, it really helps a lot with understanding responses–the other half of communication. While I’m not terribly far along in the book, I already feel I have more competence in Italian than I have after countless other books and audio courses. I’m learning the foundation of the language, not just memorizing. This approach is highly recommended.
Rating: 5 / 5
This Spring I took a Basic Italian class at the local community college and loved it. The next class isn’t until Fall, so I bought this book to keep me going over the Summer. It is an excellent review. And actually explains the grammar much better than my class did. I am loving it and learning new info as I go. Worth purchasing.
I think it moves too quickly for someone who has never taken Italian but is a excellent review and refresher for anyone with some basic understanding of the language.
Rating: 4 / 5
This review applies solely to the Kindle edition. The e-book version of “Easy Italian Step-by-Step” has not been optimized for the Kindle. I keep my reading font at 12 point, but despite that, the font size for the pages for this e-book varies wildly, from what appears to be 16 point to as low as 4 point for lists of vocabulary words.
If you are going to read this e-book, you will have to adjust your point size, up or down, to compensate for each new page. That’s an incredibly frustrating way to study a language text. I tried to fight my way through the first chapter, but it’s just not an ideal way to work. I hope future editions will correct this.
Rating: 1 / 5
If you want to learn Italian correctly, do not buy this book. It is full of mistakes (misspelled and improperly accented words, the wrong form of a word). It also has many exercises that are beyond the ability of the student, given the information introduced. For example, some exercises ask you to translate English sentences into Italian before you have been taught the grammar necessary to do so. In addition, there is no indication of pronunciation stress. Although many Italian words are stressed on the next-to-the last syllable, there are a lot of exceptions. You need to know these if you’re going to speak the language correctly. This book needs a qualified Italian language editor to give it a good going over.
Rating: 1 / 5