Customer Reviews

French, Q&S: Learn to Speak and Understand French with Pimsleur Language Programs (Pimsleur Quick & Simple)

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Don't think that you are getting 8 different lessons. Each subsequent lesson spends about 70%-80% reviewing the previous lesson. The quality of the lessons are good though, but I wish I knew that the 8 lessons don't teach much French at all. I would save the money and buy the full French 1 Language Program which has 16 CDs (the first 4 are very similar to this one).

I purchased the $15French, Q&S: Learn to Speak and Understand French with Pimsleur Language Programs (Pimsleur Quick & Simple) 4 disc set as a review. I was not aware that there is a "secret box" located somewhere on the order page (not on my copy of the order by the way) that will automatically "ENROLL" me for the Gold level package for 4 payments of $64 each. I received my unsolicited CD's in the mail on Saturday 4/23. I have called for return instructions - I will have to pay UPS to ship this horrible package back to their warehouse by 10 days - if it is not there they will continue to charge my card. I have called my card company and they say there is nothing I can do to stop this. I have already got a charge made to my card on 4/16 for $64 - 10 days before I received it. They have promised to credit me this amount and to not bill ma for any further charges - the shipping is at my own expense however. This company is a RIP OFF and should be removed as a merchant on this site. I did used to trust products bought through Amazon, but I don't anymore. This has been a shocking experience!

As some one who studied french 10 years ago in high school and college and looking to brush up for a week in france, book learning was easy but HEARING, PRONUNCIATIOn and SPEAKING were the hard parts. I broke down and purchase this at a store because my local library had NO audio books that weren't already checked out. The lessons are (8) 30-minute lessons. But the lessons are weird esp if you are using this to "brush up". The first lesson was a few sentences of speech. You then spent the next half hour of that lesson repeating EACH syllable of each word in each SHORT conversation over and over again.. No wonder they can easily package (8) 30 minute lessons. The lessons are strangely presented. It explains in what context you might use a particular phrase. For example, if you wanted to ask someone if they spoke french, you'd want to use the phrase "Est ce vous parlez l'anglais? (Do you speak English?)" Well DUH!!!! The lessons seemed geared to making you memorize key phrases, which is a bit difficult when you can't see the words that you're pronouncing, which then makes it only memorizing sounds you hear. For example the first lesson is only 7 sentences long, about two people going back and forth if they understand french or english. Bits and pieces of each sentences are recylcled over and over again in the the other sentences of this same lesson. 27 minutes devoted to this first lesson. You also need a good EAR to hear the subtleties of the french nasal pronunciation. Now I'm just mad that I tore the darn plastic off and the store won't let me return this garbage. Thank god I used a gift certificate that someone gave me as opposed to my own good money.