Colloquial Swedish

Great CDs with a rich content and very usefull. However, I bought the CDs because in the description it was written "AUDIOBOOK CD-ROM", so I thought it was the electronical version of the paperback, but when I got the CDs I was really surprised that, in fact, they ARE audio CDs and not CD-ROM as mentioned. Now, I had to buy separately the book. So, in all, interesting but only audio CDs, not CD-ROMs. Don't get wrong.

great way to learn swedish, great resource even for a teenager/kid

Except for the introductory pronunciation section, the book is fairly easy to use. The first five or six lessons are a bit slow. After that, it gets more interesting.

I learned Swedish without a single formal lesson extremely quickly (in 4 months to fluency whilst living in a Swedish / English speaking environment), and bought and borrowed an enormous range of books to bring me there. This is the book that I used to learn my first words. For the extremely early stages of learning the language I would recommend this book and tape, but once you get to about lesson 6 or 8 you will move quicker by shifting to a book concentrating on vocabulary and idioms in conjunction with The Essentials of Swedish Grammar. See my review of the Teach Yourself series Swedish book for further advice on which books I recommend as you progress through intermediate and advanced.The book is a serious textbook (but not dry and boring like in high school), and the Authors are writing it to an audience who actually want to learn Swedish, and are not interested in learning only travel phrases. This book does very nicely, but does ask you to move very quickly to get from one lesson to the next from about lesson 5 or 6. Nevertheless, you will be amazed at how quick your progress is. Each lesson takes less than an hour, so in 6 or eight hours of studying, you will be able to speak basic Swedish with a limited vocabulary using the correct word order in the present, past and future (it is at this stage also that I recommend moving off this book to one that builds vocab and another that presents you all the grammar of the language in a nutshell). You can, after spending a week or two with other books, return to this book to complete the remainder of the lessons, most of which will be very easy, some of which will still be very difficult (I dipped in and out of it but never again worked with it as true programmed learning). This book is of high quality, but needs to be used in conjunction with other books for the quickest possible gains and then should be followed up with more advanced books to continue your Swedish. This book is titled "The Complete Course" but I would like to emphasise the "For Beginners" aspect. Your learning certainly does not begin and end with this book.

This work is an excellent, thorough welcoming into the Swedish language. Having had experience with several "Colloquial" texts, this is by far the best. Not only are the important aspects of daily Swedish language tackled, but real-life situations are taught besides just phrases like "where can I change traveller's cheques?" The person who finishes this course is truly a Swedish speaker, not someone who merely gets along.