Product Description

Lounging around in a resort will make great use of your English. You could, however, grab this phrasebook and trade tiquismos with the Ticos, chase the best beach break, track down a toucan and go home knowing you’ve had an all-round pura vida time.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #177364 in Books
• Published on: 2006-09-01
• Original language: Spanish, English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9781740591195
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

Review
"...Lonely Planet phrase books have long taken a hip, streetwise approach." -- Atlanta Journal-Constitution, May 27, 2004

"Lonely Planet Phrasebooks. Portable, pocket-size, cheap, and available for almost any country you might want to visit..." -- National Geographic Traveler, September 2006

National Geographic Traveler, September 2006
'Lonely Planet Phrasebooks. Portable, pocket-size, cheap, and available for almost any country you might want to visit...'

From the Publisher
Who We Are
At Lonely Planet, we see our job as inspiring and enabling travellers to connect with the world for their own benefit and for the benefit of the world at large.

What We Do
* We offer travellers the world's richest travel advice, informed by the collective wisdom of over 350 Lonely Planet authors living in 37 countries and fluent in 70 languages.
* We are relentless in finding the special, the unique and the different for travellers wherever they are.
* When we update our guidebooks, we check every listing, in person, every time.
* We always offer the trusted filter for those who are curious, open minded and independent.
* We challenge our growing community of travellers; leading debate and discussion about travel and the world.
* We tell it like it is without fear or favor in service of the travellers; not clouded by any other motive.

What We Believe
We believe that travel leads to a deeper cultural understanding and compassion and therefore a better world.

Customer Reviews

Inferior to previous edition
This 2nd edition is more than just a beauty cleanup of the 1st. It completely changes the content, the intent and therefore the usefulness of the book. It is full of pronunciations, painstakingly spelled out as if someone was going to read them preferentially over the Spanish words. It's sort of lame, because Spanish pronunciation is basically invariable (accents aren't, of course) and if you are having trouble with it that is best fixed with a different book. It seems like there is less information, because a big chunk of the page has gone over to pronunciations. It has been scrubbed of most of the sketchier inclusions of the 1st edition, which are fun. The very useful verb endings charts and some of the Tiquismo sidebars are gone. I also find the typeface harder to read in dim light, especially the dictionary. On the plus side, it is prettier, and perhaps better organized and easier to find information.

I had my 1st edition stolen while down there. I hadn't been in a hurry to replace it, but the minute I received this 2nd edition, I scoured the 'net to locate another 1st. You should consider the same.

Some improvements
This new edition has corrected some of the mistakes I pointed out in a previous review and in an email exchange with the author. As I thumbed through the book I didn't see any "tu" conjugations, only "vos" and "usted". This is much more accurate for Costa Rican Spanish and was a blunder in the first edition. There is also an explanation at the beginning of the book about Costa Rican Spanish, which includes mention of the predominance of the voseo en Costa Rica. Nonetheless, I still give the book one star for two reasons. First the pronunciation section, as Mr. Kohnstamm informed me, was done by someone from Australia (if I remember right). So if you are from the U.S. several of the pronunciations are incorrect. Second, it only took me about a minute of looking through the book to see several mistakes in grammar and translation. Example: "Si vengas a Costa Rica..." should be "Si viene/venis a Costa Rica..." and "Adonde es la sala ejecutiva?" should be "Donde esta la sala ejecutiva?". These types of mistakes really stand out and defeat the purpose of the book, which is to help English-speaking tourists fit in and learn correct phrases for interacting with the locals... at least I think that is the purpose here.

Good for a Refresher
This book is nice to have when your going on a vacation. It's really going to help. My spanish is really dusty. This little guide will help out alot.