Rating: 
Summary: Powerful, but...
Review: ...capable of producing some fairly alarming editing errors, for one. Things like "To abrigo es distinto..."A second important item of note to potential purchasers is that the book assumes you have THE ENTIRE VERB SYSTEM down cold. Each of the 41 sections of the book has 'standard' and 'advanced' sections of vocabulary. But Word 1 in the standard list could fire off an example that features a sentence that combines conditional and subjunctive imperfect tenses. After all, it's a vocabulary - and not grammar - book. But just make sure you know that going in. Third point - I can't figure out what make a word or expression worthy of 'advanced' vs. 'standard.' I'm just opening up to a random page (p. 338) as I write this review, and I see the words 'apenas,' 'mayor,' and 'menor' in the advanced section, while 'de ninguna manera' sits in the standard. Odd, huh? Despite all these objections, this book is really a good edition to your library. Its triumph is the groupings of the words and phrases into 41 loosely defined categories. Despite what I think are three valid criticisms here, reading and re-reading this book is an effective way to increase your vocabulary. Which, after all, is its primary goal.
Rating:
Summary: Powerful, but...
Review: ...capable of producing some fairly alarming editing errors, for one. Things like "To abrigo es distinto..." A second important item of note to potential purchasers is that the book assumes you have THE ENTIRE VERB SYSTEM down cold. Each of the 41 sections of the book has 'standard' and 'advanced' sections of vocabulary. But Word 1 in the standard list could fire off an example that features a sentence that combines conditional and subjunctive imperfect tenses. After all, it's a vocabulary - and not grammar - book. But just make sure you know that going in. Third point - I can't figure out what make a word or expression worthy of 'advanced' vs. 'standard.' I'm just opening up to a random page (p. 338) as I write this review, and I see the words 'apenas,' 'mayor,' and 'menor' in the advanced section, while 'de ninguna manera' sits in the standard. Odd, huh? Despite all these objections, this book is really a good edition to your library. Its triumph is the groupings of the words and phrases into 41 loosely defined categories. Despite what I think are three valid criticisms here, reading and re-reading this book is an effective way to increase your vocabulary. Which, after all, is its primary goal.
Rating:
Summary: Powerful, but...
Review: ...capable of producing some fairly alarming editing errors, for one. Things like "To abrigo es distinto..." A second important item of note to potential purchasers is that the book assumes you have THE ENTIRE VERB SYSTEM down cold. Each of the 41 sections of the book has 'standard' and 'advanced' sections of vocabulary. But Word 1 in the standard list could fire off an example that features a sentence that combines conditional and subjunctive imperfect tenses. After all, it's a vocabulary - and not grammar - book. But just make sure you know that going in. Third point - I can't figure out what make a word or expression worthy of 'advanced' vs. 'standard.' I'm just opening up to a random page (p. 338) as I write this review, and I see the words 'apenas,' 'mayor,' and 'menor' in the advanced section, while 'de ninguna manera' sits in the standard. Odd, huh? Despite all these objections, this book is really a good edition to your library. Its triumph is the groupings of the words and phrases into 41 loosely defined categories. Despite what I think are three valid criticisms here, reading and re-reading this book is an effective way to increase your vocabulary. Which, after all, is its primary goal.
Rating: 
Summary: An essential book for your library
Review: I find this book to be very good. It offers 5500 words or so for a person to learn which is more than enough to cover general conversation on any theme, explain any thought, and say anything that is not deeply technical. A typical person's vocabulary is between 12,000-15,000 words though many of them are not used. This book is great-it is organized by themes and has more advanced words in gray. I recently got this book and find that it rounds out my vocabulary. I recommend this one and 1,001 Pitfalls in Spanish by Barron's. Both are absolutely essential for native English speakers. In fact, those two books and a lot of reviewing is adequate in my estimation for anyone with very little background in Spanish to rise to a level of fluency achieved by a small percentage of the 'gringos' who try to learn it. I'd give it a '10' except I think it would be neat to have even more vocabulary-perhaps 8000 words to involve more technical and medical terms, etc. They also try to stick to fairly universal terms understandable in any Spanish-speaking country. Many of the words are more from Spain than, say, Mexico(in my estimation) but are universal enough to be used almost anywhere. I rank it to be a "Must-Buy."
Rating:
Summary: A good book for building spanish vocabulary.
Review: I highly recommend this book for a person who is, like me, passed the beginner spanish level and wants to increase his or her vocabulary. It lists over 5,000 words grouped into 41 subjects and includes useful bilingual phrases that reenforce learning. I don't recommend this book for beginners because some knowledge of the spanish language is required to use it. Everything is translated from spanish to english and there is no english to spanish guide.
Rating: 
Summary: A book you will actually use...
Review: I own many Learn-Spanish books, however I want to become more fluent. This means you should know 2000 words. This is where this book fills a niche. It may well be my best vocabulary book yet. Good features of this book include:
- Using the word in a sentence.
- Presenting words in logical groups,, business, dinning, etc.
- Basic words listed in white, and more advanced spanish words listed in blue. Very helpful because I can focus on the basic vocabulary, thus making better use of my learning time. I would love to see more in the 'false friends' notes. I would like to see words that are spelled similar but are different, such as cansado and casado, encuentro, encuentra. Common words with similar spellings are a trouble spot for learners.
Rating:
Summary: An excellent source for enlarging vocabulary.
Review: I own many Learn-Spanish books, however I want to become more fluent. This means you should know 2000 words. This is where this book fills a niche. It may well be my best vocabulary book yet. Good features of this book include:
- Using the word in a sentence.
- Presenting words in logical groups,, business, dinning, etc.
- Basic words listed in white, and more advanced spanish words listed in blue. Very helpful because I can focus on the basic vocabulary, thus making better use of my learning time. I would love to see more in the 'false friends' notes. I would like to see words that are spelled similar but are different, such as cansado and casado, encuentro, encuentra. Common words with similar spellings are a trouble spot for learners.
Rating:
Summary: Great vocabulary book for the advanced student
Review: Like my title suggests, this is a great book for the advanced student, but way too deep for the beginner. I first ran across this book during my sixth year of Spanish study in graduate school. It helped me a lot to build on an already extensive working vocabulary. This would actually be a great book for beginners if the words were phonetically spelled out, but unfortunately, their not. If you're looking to build your existing vocabulary, give it a try, otherwise, pass for a more beginning-type vocabulary approach. Have fun and good luck!
Rating:
Summary: Lots of work, lots of words
Review: Make no mistake, learning this entire book is a lot of work, but it is well worth it. I actually have taken a different approach to learning with this book. I prefer learning without translating, so I use a black ballpoint pen and mark over the most important words and phrases in the example sentences, then write them above, perhaps drawing a small picture to help me remember what the sentence means. It really thrashes the book, but I prefer learning in this way. As I am marking up the sentence I repeat the sentence to myself. Then I go over the sentence 3-5 times in blocks of 3-4 sentences, testing myself to see if I remember the words or phrases in blanks. After I finish a page I test myself on the whole thing. I try to only use the English translation to make sure I understand what everything means, and I regularly review the sections I've already completed. So far I've finished about a third of the book, and I'm also using the Street Spanish series for a little more casual vocab. I would be more interested in a more Latin-American focused version of this text, since I am studying abroad in Venezuela, but that's OK. It does include a list of Latin-American words at the end of the book. The problem with this book is it doesn't have exercises to help you learn the words, but my way of using the book seems to work well enough.
Rating:
Summary: Lots of work, lots of words
Review: Make no mistake, learning this entire book is a lot of work, but it is well worth it. I actually have taken a different approach to learning with this book. I prefer learning without translating, so I use a black ballpoint pen and mark over the most important words and phrases in the example sentences, then write them above, perhaps drawing a small picture to help me remember what the sentence means. It really thrashes the book, but I prefer learning in this way. As I am marking up the sentence I repeat the sentence to myself. Then I go over the sentence 3-5 times in blocks of 3-4 sentences, testing myself to see if I remember the words or phrases in blanks. After I finish a page I test myself on the whole thing. I try to only use the English translation to make sure I understand what everything means, and I regularly review the sections I've already completed. So far I've finished about a third of the book, and I'm also using the Street Spanish series for a little more casual vocab. I would be more interested in a more Latin-American focused version of this text, since I am studying abroad in Venezuela, but that's OK. It does include a list of Latin-American words at the end of the book. The problem with this book is it doesn't have exercises to help you learn the words, but my way of using the book seems to work well enough.
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