Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2690631 in Books
• Published on: 2003-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 260 pages

Customer Reviews

Good intentions but flawed in so many silly ways:
I picked up this book from the library to learn more about the steps necessary for me to marry my American girlfriend. I had already read quite extensively both on the "About.com" pages but also on the official US immigration site.

The content of this book is, as far as I can tell, fairly accurate although I question one of the statements (see below). So why did I only give it 2 stars then?

My problem with this book can be divided into two parts, the authors fault and the publishers\editors fault:

The publisher\editor
The book is hardly more than an unfinished draft. On several pages, printed words have been blocked out with a pencil and corrections made by hand. One paragraph heading used the word "ENTERY" where the second "E" had been crossed out with a pencil. In other places, commas have been added and whole sections painted over and typed on top. Sometimes the headings are misaligned compared to the rest of the document and at one place it was so bad that some letters of the heading had "fallen" off of the page and been written in by hand. The booklet is also riddled with misspelled words. I don't pretend to be super-qualified in English and I know of the difficulties faced when writing in a non-native language, but then again I haven't published my texts as a book yet. To me it seems that someone messed up and handed in one of the unfinished draft papers to press instead of the finished, edited and proof read draft.
As a footnote, the printing quality in my version of the book was of low quality, often it looked like the press was running out of toner and a good light and straining eyes would have to be employed.

The author:
As for the contents, it is detailed, quite well organized, and as far as I can tell, accurate. My biggest grief was caused by the extremely long sentences used throughout the book.
(example: "Whatever else may be said to be involved in obtaining an entry visa by which an alien can become lawfully admitted into (or to remain in) the United States, the process itself is, at its most basic level, primarily a clerical and ministerial operation, requiring no complex "legal" procedures or expertise or any specialized technical theories or knowledge of law, or one which calls for a lawyer or other such professional.")

In my opinion, after having read extensively in the book, the text leaves a lot to be wished in terms of "easy reading", but is quite covering non the less if you can force yourself to keep reading.
However, one advice I can not figure out. In chapter 7 "The K-1 Visa: A Special Entry Visa For Fiance(e)s Engaged To Marry A U.S. Citizen" it was written that: "In fact the K-1 Visa has no real value or purpose - other than, in other words, to serve as a preliminary step to getting a permanent resident visa." (The quote is accurate down to the bad sentence structure.) He also claims that money would be saved by just go ahead and marry and then file for a visa as an immediate relative instead of first getting the K-1 visa, marry and then apply for the immediate relative visa. At first this sounds reasonable, and the claim that you would save money sounds true, BUT consider this:
If the alien travels to America with the intent to marry, he has to lie to get in, or risk being turned away at the border (this is why the K-1 even exists), and in order to get the immediate relative visa based on marriage, you have to enter America legally. Clearly the alien can not go to America to marry then. So the American travels to the alien and marries there, adding expenses in the form of extra round trip tickets. Also, the newly wed could not return to America as a couple, rather the "better half" would have to stay in his country of origin pending the processing of the "immediate relative based on marriage visa". Maybe I just missed out on something, somewhere, but I honestly think that the 135$ K-1 Visa fee is worth it, since you can then travel to America, get married and stay. Also, in the chapter of marriage based Visa, he goes on in great length about the importance of honesty throughout the application process and the difficulties of proving that the marriage is real and not a bluff to get a green card.... So why not do it the proper way through the K-1 visa then??

To sum up: Do not buy this book (pick it up at your library instead), look for other books on Amazon or better yet, spend the hours on the official page and guides. It has good information, but is not worth the money and almost not the time it takes to read it either. The information contained can for the most part be picked up using the official web-page, although that isn't trivial a task either. Libraries are a fine thing, use them.