Italian (Eyewitness Travel Packs)

Rating:
Summary: Not Very Useful
Review: I love the Eyewitness Guide books, so I figured the Phrase Book would be equally good. Well, I was wrong. Unless I wanted to tell someone in Italian how old I am (which just didn't come up on this trip) or some similarly useless phrase, I found very little help here. Plus, the mini-dictionary in the edition I carried with me only went fron English to Italian. If I had a need to translate an Italian word, unless I knew which category to look under, I was out of luck -- and that's assuming it was in there at all. Use the Eyewitness Guides; they're great. But find another Phrase Book if you want to actually be able to use it in a foreign country.

Rating:
Summary: Practical & helpful...an excellent book
Review: The Eyewitness Travel Phrase books are excellent guides for tourists looking to communicate as much as possible in foreign languages. They include a host of phrases that can be very helpful in many situations - there are the classic "Can you tell me what time it is?" to a variety of more complex or particular expressions. There's also a section on spelling and pronounciation. It also includes expressions used not only while on vacation, but also while doing business.

This little book is also quite handy thanks to it's size, it fits perfectly on any pocket. It also includes a section with a simple dictionary that can be very helpful in identifying a variety of words.

The book is very good at doing its job, which is helping people cross the language barriers while abroad. However, it shouldn't be mistaken with an Italian language course. This is book is not meant to teach you the Italian language, but to give you a good enough understanding of it so you can travel without major inconveniences. If you want to expand on the language, you need to get other books.