Everyday Japanese

I'm a relatively new student of Japanese, and I found this book to be useful.The book is arranged in 34 sections, in 3 parts, with numbered illustrations and 3 indexes to make things easier to find. True, it's not as fun as Marc Bernabe's "Japanese in Mangaland" books, but it's not exactly a dry, confusing textbook either.

This book was the very first book I ever got when I took the first big step of deciding I wanted to teach myself Japanese. I found the pronunciation guide helpful, although at a glance, it was hard to understand. For every subject they mention, however, they give great dialogue and explanations of certain words, cultural differences, etc. I was 14 when I began reading this book, and was able to understand it very well. However, being on my own with this language had its downfalls, for when I actually got into a classroom, I found I had the pronunciation a little off, but I was able to pick up very quickly on the hiragana and katakana writing systems, sentence structure, and vocabulary. This is a great beginner's book!!!!

While in university as an exchange-student-to-be, I rec'd this from my future homestay in Tokyo. It has since become on of my favorite quick references. Through college, five years in Japan, a Master's degree, and teaching Japanese@13 years it is still useful. This book has anything and everything, albeit just introductions to each subject, very useful pictures (for visual learners like me), and quite an array of vocabulary. I would suggest it as basicfor anyone needing information about Japan.@