Customer Reviews

Italian Phrase Book (Eyewitness Travel Guide) (English and Italian Edition)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

A phrasebook isn't going to teach you the language. I mean, what if you can actually use it to ask directions for your hotel? THEN WHAT? You won't be able to understand the answer anyway!!! At that point, you're better off just learning "Mi scusi, parla inglese?" (excuse me, do you speak English?). The best thing would be to take a group course before your trip.
Still, phrasebooks are useful to decipher menu items and for emergency situations. For instance, when you need to find a pharmacy because you've been walking too much and now your feet are full of blisters! How do you say "bandaid"? There you go! I'm OK with this book, but I think Lonely Planet's is easier to look through when you need to find something FAST.
Italian: Lonely Planet Phrasebook

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.

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.

this little book (ideal size for travel)seems to have an easy way to find words in Italian to make yourself comfortable moving about small villages where English speakers may not be found. Haven't used it yet but we anticipate good things.

All you need to know to travel around Italy. Good stuff.

This little book helped us get through our trip to Sicily. The menu and driving sections were of the most use. When we used the book, most people understood us since there is a phonetic guide under each phrase. The only thing I noticed is that there are probably some dialectical variations in Sicily because certain words or phrases were not understood when we used them. It could have been our pronunciation too, I can't rule that out! It is small and compact too, so you can be discreet if needed.