Dictionary Reviews

This Oxford Dictionary is a true gem. It is the best general English Spanish dictionary written to date. In addition to having excellent meaning discrimination, it often includes the informal register in its explanations as well as the formal registers.

It is a tremendous resource for really understanding the nuances and shades of meaning between different synonyms and expressions.

As a translator, professor, and bilingual lexicographer, I am truly deeply impressed with this masterpiece.

This is a terrific dictionary used in conjunction with the Oxford Duden Pictorial Spanish and English Dictionary for hard to locate technical words. The Cassell's Spanish Dictionary can lead to a lot of imprecise translations in your readings, but it's useful in composition as a thesaurus.

This is the most complete Spanish/English I have ever found. It can be used for Business, School or Personal purposes. It has all idioms and phrases that you could ever need.

I think that anyone interested in studying Spanish, especially if they want to study it on their own, should have this workbook as part of their repertoire. I have found it invaluable. I recommend it highly. (I have also purchased and studied her other workbook on Verb Tenses and the reviews for both books are similar.)

I have given the book a 4 star rating rather than five for the following reasons:

1. Lack of an index: I find it hard to comprehend how a contemporary academic book can be published without an index. There is a tremendous amount of valuable information contained in this book but being limited to the Table of Contents or to ones memory of where a specific item can be found is debilitating. This is a terrible ommission.

2. There are times when the Author appears to have been in a rush and has not either given sufficient examples or explanations on why a particular rule was invoked. One is left to wonder if there is a fundamental misunderstanding of the point being made or if there is simply a typographical error. Those who are reading this book on their own, without the benefit of an instructor, would benefit greatly from some additional explanations (and cross references.) It is clear from the book's Acknowledgements page that Dorothy Richmond wrote this book because of the persistent nagging of her students to provide additional examples, but most readers will not be in her classroom, rather, they will be virtual students, highly dependent upon additional textual clarification.

This book and the other Practice-Makes-Perfect workbook by Dorothy Richmond ("Spanish Verb Tenses") are the best Spanish books I've ever used. I just got back from 2 years in the Peace Corps in Honduras and I studied these books every day. They REALLY helped me learn more Spanish! In addition to the concise, easy-to-understand instruction sections, there's tons of exercises to do (with the correct answers in the back of the book) and as I did the exercises, I picked up all kinds of things that I'd been wondering how to say. I also liked this workbook a lot because it covered all those difficult things I never understood before, like how to use "lo que..", direct and indirect object pronouns, the passive voice, the difference between "para" and "por", and many other things. (This book is especially great if you already know some Spanish because you need some vocabulary to do the exercises, unless you don't mind looking up lots of words in the dictionary.) I highly recommend this book!

Spanish Pronouns and Prepositions is a great book for practicing these often forgotten parts of speech that are critical for achieving fluency in Spanish. 14 units, 3-12 pages each, each cover a different use of pronouns in Spanish, and prepositions (especially por and para) likewise receive extensive coverage. Each unit opens with a bit of reading, but the practice starts quickly. The book's translation exercises are especially valuable for learning vocabulary and forming sentences in context. The answers to all the exercises are in the back, so you can get instant feedback on how well you are doing.

I've noticed a problem with this text, however. While each unit includes at least several exercises, I feel that this is often not enough to gain a firm understanding of the material. With so many different uses of pronouns, for example, it is easy to forget the one done six units ago. And since the text teaches the uses of so many different prepositions, more practice with them would be helpful. As a result, I believe this book could be improved by including additional exercises in each unit, plus several review translation exercises that incorporate the content of multiple units.

Even with this minor problem, this book is easily the best workbook that I've seen for learning Spanish pronouns and prepositions. And for $10, it's tough to go wrong (Spanish workbooks inferior to this that are used in my college cost $20-30 or more). Go ahead, buy it!

This is the cleverest, most intuitive language learning book I have ever read. I am an ESL teacher and I've seen a lot of books to help students learn languages. Also, I've been studying Spanish all my adult life--always working to improve it. This book is the best, most helpful Spanish text I have ever used, starting with simple cognates, then simple past tense,the progression feels effortless. I couldn't put it down for a month. I highly recommend it!

I've used many different books to learn Spanish, and found that Margarita Madrigal really is the easiest. Instead of immediatly teaching us to memorize verb conjugation, she starts out with a commom ground. What do I mean? Well, from the very first chapter she shows us that we know many spanish words already. For example, Here are some spanish words that every English-speaking person knows....popular, capital, animal, hotel, radio, conductor, cable, actor, ideal, fexible, central. Is that incredible or what? Margarita goes on to show us other words that we can easily recognize, such as optimista, dentista, artista,importante and presidente. All of these are very easy words to recognize and use. Of course this does not mean that her book is shallow or too easy. As you continue on in her book, you will see very detailed explanations and verb conjugations. This publication has been extensively used in many missionary homes by Jehovah's Witnesses, to enable these missionaries to really communicate with and understand Spanish-speaking people in all of Latin America. This book is a must for anyone who truly wants to learn Spanish the way it is spoken.

I've taken all kinds of foreign language classes to no avail. I used to be convinced that I'm just foreign-language stupid, doomed to be mono-lingual for the rest of my life.

After reading the glowing customer reviews here at amazon for Madrigal's Magic Key, I decided to take a chance on it.

I'm not too far into the book yet - I'm still on "leccion numero cinco" - but I'm already speaking Spanish with confidence. My Cuban-American boyfriend helps me with my pronounciation and tests me on my vocabulary. We are already having simple, short conversations entirely in Espanol - after only five lessons!

I bought this book along with Madrigal's "See It and Say It in Spanish" and find they complement each other very well. I actually use the Reminder Cards from Magic Key, and I do all the sentence-forming exercises and translations; combined with writing down the vocabulary from "See It and Say It" and posting the words around my house to read and remember at random as I go about my day to day life, I'm picking things up very quickly, and my boyfriend is highly impressed with my Espanol! Ms Madrigal has made it so that you are creating Spanish words and sentences on your own from the very first lesson, building up your confidence and making it all seem so easy and fun.

I will not repeat what other reviewers have said about this classic learner's dictionary. It has been a valuable reference for ESL students for many decades. I own several learner's dictionaries published recently (Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English 4th Edition, Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary, and Collins Cobuild 3rd edition) and some of them have features this one does not have. But I still use this dictionary a lot and will continue to use it. I hope a new edition of it will come out soon.

No other book on my bookshelf is more worn out. I use it all the time. When I started to study English I used to use an English / Portuguese (my first language) dictionary but I could only actually improve my English when I started using the Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary.

The dictionary has lots of pictures (over 1700) for words that can be explained but for which a picture is much more effective like "hinge". The words have a pronunciation guide with a mark (') showing the main stress. There are many useful appendixes like irregular verbs conjugation, usage of numbers, punctuation, family relationships and a few colorful maps.

Over 220 usage notes clarify the subtle differences among words such as dealer trader and merchant. Although it's mainly a British English dictionary the differences in spelling, use or pronunciation between American English and British English are stressed.

By far the most interesting feature is the extremely reduced defining vocabulary constituted of 3500 words. The great majority of definitions are written using that reduced defining vocabulary. This simplifies the definitions and it's a great starting vocabulary for the beginners. The use of such a small defining vocabulary rules out the use of this dictionary as a thesaurus but the advantages compensate this drawback.

My copy is a paper back that has been reinforced with adhesive tape. This makes the dictionary lighter and handy. I used to put it on my back pack and take it to all my classes when I started college in USA.

The drawbacks are the need of an additional thesaurus and the fact that the entries are not syllabified. Nevertheless I would give it 10 stars if I could.

Leonardo Alves - December 2000

I have recently bought the millenium edition (hardbound) of this book. In my scientific studies (I study Scientology which uses a precise study technology that demands a good dictionary to look up misunderstood words) a good dictionary is vital.
This one has been very helpful to me as it gives precise yet comprehensible definitions. This is maybe the most important point of all.
I found it very easy to look up a word i did not understand and gain a conceptual understanding of that word after a short period of time. The definitions just make sense and are not too complicated and confusing.
It also includes example sentences and idioms and information for the further usage of a particular word.
It also has a section with colored pictures (maps, categories such as clothing, food, animals etc.) that provide a picture of the real thing that the word represents - a quite useful tool for foreigners and non native speakers like me.

If you are currently studying english, reading english texts (but have a limited vocabulary) or just don't want to run into too many complexities when using a dictionary and don't want to be too confused but you just want to know the meaning of a word and understand it, then this is the right dictionary for you.

As it is a dictionary for "learners" it does not include things like etymology and syllables (the only negative points), technical definitions (although it includes some where their appearance is reasonable) etc.

But it includes phonetic symbols at the bottom of each page and has, as all dictionaries, a section wich explains each symbol and abbreviation that can appear in an entry.
If there would appear some symbol or abbreviation in the entry that you wouldn't understand, you would find it easy to find its meaning as everything in this dictionary is exactly where you would consider it to be.
So you don't fool around loosing time and getting frustrated. I think the editors of some dictionaries assume that you already know all these symbols but include their definitions anyway in a very complicated way.

Not with this one.
I highly recommend this dictionary. You can buy it without reservations.
But...you should have a second one with etymologies at hand.

When I was living in London, I found a copy of this book on one of the many tables at the used book market under Waterloo Bridge. I had always enjoyed 'Dune' quite a bit (not so much the sequels). It was a snip at 5 pounds, if I recall, and I realize now (after reading these reviews) that I was lucky to purchase it.

I can't blame those of you who are clamoring for a copy, because it must seem like a very exciting idea for a book. However, the articles in the Encyclopedia vary widely in quality, as they were written by a motley collective of people at the Prof's university. Their enthusiasm is fun, but their ideas don't seem to quite gel with Herbert's work in some cases. In other words, a lot of the writing doesn't feel quite 'Dune' and the illustrations are mediocre (you're better off with your imagination or Lynch's baroque artistic vision). At times, it reminded me a little of -- and this isn't praise -- fanfic.

Still, Herbert was apparently delighted by the enterprise and agreed to its publication, which (as someone has pointed out) is more than can be said for the 'prequels.' However, keep in mind that the Encyclopedia only covers material for the first four books- the puzzles of the last two get no Herbert-approved elucidation (rats!).

It would be nice if they'd reprint the Encyclopedia for the curious (although I don't see it happening, now that the prequels are offering a lucrative competitive vision of the past), but it'd be nicer if they'd just print Herbert's notes in their rawest form so that we could just deduce for ourselves what the hell was supposed to happen next.

I read this book back in 1986 and I do agree that a reprint is needed. It allowed a more indepth look at the Dune universe of Frank Herbert. It would be a shame if this book was allowed to crumble to dust, when many fans would like to put it on their shelves. Startrek, Starwars and some other popular series have millions of copies of their own encyclopedias. It's time to bring back the one encyclopedia we want to see again.

With another God-awful post-Dune book due soon, it seems as if the blasphemers (who shall remain nameless) continue to cash in on Frank Herbert's legacy. And that's the fault of anyone who continues to buy them. It only feeds the greed.

And yet this tome, the only Dune book not written by Herbert yet endorsed by him, is out of print!

I got hooked on Dune many years ago as a teenager, right around the time Lynch's movie was coming out, and I remember flipping through the Dune Encyclopedia in a bookstore before I read the books. Something in its near-scientific comprehensiveness, it's meticulous faith to the Herbert's vision really mezmerized me.

When I finally got around to reading the first three Dune novels, I went right to that store and picked up my copy of Dune Encyclopedia. My thirst to know more about Herbert's universe was insatiable. How did the Sardaukar develop into the most fearsome tool of Corrino power? What are the other worlds of the Imperium like? How was the Guild founded? Here I found a wealth of information that made Dune much more complete and inspiring.

What's more astonishing is that the contributers are faithful Dune-thinkers. Yes this is a work of fiction, but the articles are written in the style and manner of scholarly works. In a way, this style also serves as it's own contribution to the original Dune saga: that regardless of the legendary feats of the great, the historian always has the final word.

Dune Encyclopedia is an incredible, valuable companion to Herbert's work. Find a copy and keep it safe. I still have mine, which I read regularly, with its well-worn pages and torn cover that I've mended with packing tape several times.

[If you're the publisher, please reprint it, and try to prevent another post-Dune abomination from being published while you're at it. Thanks.]

This English-Arabic dictionary is second best to E.W. Lane's Arabic-English Lexicon. For those Muslims who have been studying Arabic for several years then you will benefit from this book only in regards to the Arabic Verb Forms. Hans Wehr did an excellent job of arranging the verb forms but the only offset is that he did so using the Roman letters and not the standard Wazan that the old Arabic Scholars have observed in explaining the different verb forms. I do not recommend the Hans Wehr for study of the classical Arabic or Islamic Studies as it contains modern meanings of words as Arabs use today and not as it was understood in the time of our beloved Prophet(may the peace and blessings of Allah be upon him). However if you do buy this dictionary buy both the small hardback and the large hardback as they will last longer. The small hardcopy is very hard on the eyes though for you students of knowledge who spend long hours studying. I have found this dictionary helpful when I could not walk around with the Arabic-English Lexicon but it also came in handy when I completed my studies of the 3 Madinah Books commonly used in the Islamic University of Madinah, K.S.A. May Allah make us all to know and understand His Book and the authentic narrations of His Prophet (may the peace and blessings of Allah be upon him)in the Arabic Language.

I'm pretty damn serious. I have found rare words and rare synonyms of good words. If a word can not be found in the Oxford Arabic-English dictionary, or any other dictionary I've used, at least 50% of the time I found it in the Hans Wehr. This is an excellent resource for Arabic speakers and non-indigenous speakers who are learning or learned Arabic. A life-saver in many take-home essay exams.

Probably the best available arabic english dictionary to date. I highly recommend it to both new learners of Arabic and to scholars too.

Excellent and UNIQUE resource, better than most thesauri because it contains glossaries of common terminology in many fields. Take "Dance." Here you will find a list of many different kinds and styles of dance (square dance, line dance, pas de deux, pas de trois, merengue, tango, etc.) Thus, you get way more than you do with a thesaurus that simply provides synonyms for words that you must originate. From what I read in the introduction, the editor Stephen Glazier had kept these word lists for his own writing. Now, we can all write with his vocabulary lists, however they have been contributed by experts in the respective subject areas.

Occasionally, I have found a gap or missing word, e.g. I tried to find a synonym for the verb to flourish (as in brandish) but could only find the noun flourish as in a rhetoric device.

Still, this is one of the best references I have seen for writers!

This is the book to use if you don't know the name for an object but know the general category to which it belongs.

The idea behind this book is to group words into menus just like computer commands are grouped into menus. Glazier implemented this basic idea fairly well when he arranged this book.

The book is split into seven parts (Nature, Science and Technology, Domestic Life, Institutions, Arts and Leisure, Language, and The Human Condition). Each of the parts, in turn, is split into three or four chapters (a total of 25 chapters in all). Each chapter contains one or two levels of subject categories. The words contained in each subject category are listed in alphabetical order.

For example, you need to know the name for a phobia. Look up Part 3 - Institutions, Chapter 13 - Social Sciences, Psychology, Phobias. You can then skim the alphabetical list of phobias for the phobia you're looking for.

While this book is useful, I found it to be very entertaining as well. Flipping through its pages is like going through a linguistic museum of curiousities. (Just reflect on what words you may find under the subject category "Insults, Slurs, and Epithets", and you may get an idea of what I mean.) It is perfect for people who think that vocabulary study is boring.

Two things to consider, though.

1. To get full use out of the book, you must have a feel for how the book is organized. The learning curve is slight, but it is there.

2. Because you are required by the book's format to scan through lists of words, this book was formatted to make it easy to scan. This means that the definitions are sketchy and and there is no pronunciation guide. This is OK so long as you have an excellent dictionary to fill in the gaps left by the Word Menu.

While I'm sure this book could be useful to students, I think that fiction writers could benefit the most from it. When I'm writing I'm always looking for words that aren't exactly synonyms but of a type. Like different kinds of dwellings or names of instruments. This is the first resource I've found that arranged words according to the way I need to look for them.

I am a game player who plays WWII Online, and I was interested in learning more about the Panzers of the German army during WWII. Before buying this book, I had no idea about the tanks Germany used except that one of them was called a Tiger. Now, I know more than most people who play the game.

This book is simply amazing. It's extradinary organization goes to show you just how professionally written this book is. It shows every Panzer model from Panzer I to Panzer VI and then some! It contains armor penetration values, optical equipment, radio equipment, and ammunition equipment diagrams that give you a good deal of information.

Its comprehensive and easy to follow lay out is quite powerful for anybody wanting to know the specs of any german tank.

The depth of the articles about each tank is the only negative aspect however (if you really want to call it negative), which is both good and bad. Like some books that ramble on and on, this book skips the b.s. and tells you the facts. I'm not talking about Tank specifications (they are quite indepth, and use the same format for every tank), I'm talking about the text that goes with the specifications. Still not bad enough to take a star off though :).

Definately worth your money!

Thi book is an absolute must for every ww2 enthusiast,modeler and technical enthusiast.This book cover every tank selfpropelled gun and tracked,half tracked and armored vhiecle ever produced or even experimented by the Geramn's during ww2 and even before that, plus it covers the prototypes. I think that this book is the best encyclopidia on german armour during ww2, with over 1000 black and white photo's it is an indispensable rereference.Worth every penny,highly recomended.

This book is full of great pictures and descriptions of all the german vehicles used in WWII. It is the best book I have seen (& own) about this subject matter. I would definitly buy this book again!...

This encyclopedia, which I first came across in 1989, gets better with each revision.

All the authors are closely associated with quiz shows. Their love for and knowledge of the game show form shows in their attention to detail. And in the odd case when little is known of a particular program (often the case with 1940s and 1950s shows), they say so.

The items are often cross-referenced several ways, such as specific programs a host/announcer did and number of Emmy Awards won. And the minutiae is woven in with wonderful photos, some of them rare.

One burning question I'd like answered in any future revision is exactly how involved other Goodson staffers were as the actual creators of TV games that are usually credited to Mark Goodson himself. The book doesn't make clear, for example, whether or not Bob ('Pyramid') Stewart himself created 'Password,' 'To Tell the Truth' and 'The Price Is Right' during his tenure with Goodson-Todman Productions, as most reference books say he did. (Nothing against Goodson, who was a true genius as a producer -- the authors might also want to mention how very important Goodson was in supporting actors who were otherwise out of work during the dreaded McCarthy era.)

All in all, though, this is a wonderful volume.

This book is a must for all TV game show fans! (and who isn't?) 55 years of game shows complete with rules and game summaries! All of the popular favorites are included! You'll find: "Pyramid" ,"Price Is Right" , "Match Game" , "Jeopardy!" "PressYour Luck" and more! (Did you know that "Press Your Luck " was based on a short lived 1977 game "Second Chance"? I guess the "Whammy" brought the concept luck the second time around.) This complete guide also includes more obscure TV Game Show treasures like "The MoneyMaze" (1977) which starred George Clooney's dad Nick Clooney, and the most exciting ,fast-paced game show "Whew!" (1979)which starred game show legend Ton Kennedy. You'll find all of your favorites in this great book! I CAN'T WAIT FOR THE FOURTH EDITION! And THE FIFTH! SIGN ME UP!

This is the ultimate game show book to end all other game show books. This book lists every game show ever aired on television including the Dumont Network and cable channels. This book covers 517 different tv game shows in alphabetical order from the first tv game show special "Truth Or Consequences" on NBC, July 1, 1941, the first continuing CBS tv game show, "CBS Television Quiz" on July 2, 1941 and hundreds of others to 1995. 341 pages full with 152 photographs that will stimulate your memory. This book includes a listing of when all network tv stations and some cable stations began tv service. Even DuMont is listed. A chronology of game shows from the first in 1941 to 1995. A list of tv game shows by network. A list of the longest-running television game shows. Game Show Award winners and Nominees. Top-rated game shows from 1952-1971. TV game shows that began on radio. Game Shows that have had multiple runs. Index of game show personalities. A game show index. Name index and profession index. It was good to see Geoff Edwards, Art James, Jim Lange and Tom Kennedy again.

this f'in book is full of so much f'in poop, its unbelievable. the biotch that wrote this must be on crack or sumthin. i bought this book and was like dang, what a waste of money. i looked up a dream to see what it represents, and it said i was going through my period. im a f'in dude, i dont even have a vergina.

Paying attention to your dreams and interpreting the messages they send can change your life. Betty Bethards offers an inspirational, non-threatening look at how dreams can guide you to your true path. I admire her work so much that I have included this book on the suggested reading list of my own book titled, Rat Race Relaxer: Your Potential & The Maze of Life.

There are many astounding things about this book. One astounding thing is that the symbols interpreted in the book are universal. I dream something, I look it up, the explanation in the book is true. Another astounding thing about this book is that as I grow and change, I find new meanings in my dreams and the book continues to explain them. The first 50+ pages are full of excellent insights as to "why we are here" and what life is all about. All other dream books I've read pale in comparison to Betty Bethards's book. I've given the book to several friends, because every time I lend it out I don't get it back.