- Vittoria Bowles
Part of the 'Teach Yourself' series, this book can be bought separately or with a audio CD or cassette and is part of a series which includes Quick Fix Italian Grammar, Italian Verbs, Italian Vocabulary and Instant Italian, which is just a potted version of this Beginner's Italian book.
The book, in a handy size which will fit easily into handbag or coat pocket, contains 20 chapters, each of which concentrates on a different subject matter, such as Finding Accommodation, Family Life, How much is it? and What's the Weather Like? Each chapter contain sections on key words and phrases, dialogues, grammatical notes and tests at the end to check your knowledge. Learners can tackle an entire chapter at once or spend just a few minutes a day on working through the sections, which makes the book very manageable for those who haven't much time to spend each day.
The learning difficulty graduates steadily throughout the book without being overwhelming, so by the end of the book readers should have mastered all the basics needed for exploring and living in Italy. And a refreshing lack of gimmicks such as illustrations or over-complicated tasks means no time is wasted when it comes to learning a wide and useful vocabulary.