Product Description

This handy grammar provides clear and simple explanations of today's written and spoken Japanese. Comprehensive and easy to use, with coverage of all the key points of Japanese grammar, it is the ideal reference tool for beginner and intermediate students, whether at school, college, or learning on their own. It is also an excellent support book to Oxford's Take Off In Japanese audio pack, or to any language learning course. Thousands of examples in an instantly accessible layout show how the language works. The verb tables are clear and easy-to-use and all grammatical terms are explained in a glossary.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #90514 in Books
• Published on: 2003-09-11
• Original language: Japanese, English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 288 pages

Customer Reviews

Good Buy
This is a really good book, though maybe not for the very beginner, but great for everyone else. It has a lot of stuff in it but one fault is that it does not have word lists so you need to get those from other sources. It does look daunting from the start, an idea is not to read it in order, maybe start with the chapters on: Verbs then Nouns then Adjectives. Overall a very informing book

Good book, except for a few typos
I have been studying Japanese for almost two years now and although I had a Japanese grammar book already, written almost completely in Japanese, I decided to get a book that had English explanations.

I'm quite happy with this book and really glad the examples are not written entirely in romaji. Using it as a reference book, I find that sometimes it is difficult to find the topic I am looking for as the way the book is laid out is ... unconventional.

I have noticed that there a few typos. I've only read about 20 pages and have noticed 3-4 so far, maybe I'm just unlucky and the rest of the book doesn't contain any.

Overall a good book for the beginner and even the intermediate learner.

Good
There are several good books available on Japanese grammar but the problem is they usually only cover specific areas which means you have to spend a fortune buying each one. This book, however, covers a great deal of the essential information and it won't break the bank balance. I must say, though, it is CERTAINLY not for beginners as explanations are very short in order to fit in as much as possible. One thing that I found particularly annoying was the lack of consistency in using Romaji- all exemplary sentences are provided in both script and romanized form, yet there are many tables and headings where it is assumed you are already know the whole Hiragana syllabary. Of course, I wholeheartedly agree that being able to read Japanese script is an essential part of learning the language, but if they are going to use Romaji in some instances, they should be consistent! To be fair, though, a Hiragana and Katakana chart has been included at the back of the book. Another minor annoyance was that there is the occasional error in the Romaji; nothing major, but could still cause confusion.
All in all, then, a worthy purchase if you already know quite a bit of Japanese and require an inexpensive reference book on key grammar points.