Berlitz Essential Russian

Having gone through a number of competing entry level textbooks, this one gets my highest recommendation as it takes you through the steps with just the right amount of grammar to give you a good understanding of the concepts. The dialogues use a contemporary and lively language, they are memorable, and throughout the text the key concepts are reinforced so that learning is almost painless, if that is the "mot juste". I also have "The New Penguin Russian Course", the "Routledge Colloquial Russian", and Living Language's Russian. In comparison, the Berlitz text is your quickest introduction to the language. Where others fall short, Essential Russian has a lot of useful expressions and situational dialogue, which is designed to give you a lot more confidence when you're put to the test of actually using the language.

If you studied Russian 25 years ago, traveled to Russia, enjoyed the culture, but haven't spoken Russian for over 2 decades, this is your book.Seriously speaking, if you have ever studied Russian and need a refresher course, buy this book.I was happy to discover that this book was NOT for novices but for past students of Russian. It's worth the money, and then some.

I have to agree with the reviewer from Iceland. When I began learning Russian, this was one of the first books I purchased. Unfortunately, I had to abandon it as soon as I reached chapter 4 or 5, because I realized that I didn't understand the noun endings well enough to correctly answer the excercises. There are charts and examples of these endings, but I didn't feel that they were explained sufficiently for the absolute beginner. Aside from the authors' explanation of certain points of grammar, however, I thought that this was a great book. I enjoyed it, and had no further problems after purchasing a separate Russian grammar reference.

I enjoyed reading the book. I felt it was useful in helping to reinforce what I learned in my basic Russian class and a good refresher before my second Russian. I felt that the book is good for someone who understands the basics, not someone trying to learn the basics.