A Second Spanish Reader: A Dual-Language Book (Dover Dual Language Spanish) Paperback – September 22, 2009

Currently, I am an overall beginner (advanced beginner perhaps) in Spanish with intermediate reading skills. I would argue that the book is quite good for an intermediate reader, specifically because the translation is good and ideally placed thanks to the dual language format. It is a solid book to read intensively as I find it exposes a good snapshot of the richness and variety of the language. I was always taught to seek material one level of abstraction beyond what I expect to need daily and that is precisely what excellent literature like this offers. I would have been quite disappointed had I opened the text and found a dumbed-down version of Spanish literature with contrived content. The author's selection packs substantial learning opportunity per page read, offering a very good combination of interesting and efficient. I'd dare almost anyone to read this at intermediate and write an honest review saying that they didn't learn quite a bit.

This book is definitely a great resource as it contains 50 excerpts from Spanish literature spanning 500 years along with their corresponding English translations, but to echo what others have said it certainly is not as described on the back cover as "geared towards beginners". I am at a fairly advanced level in Spanish and I had difficulty reading the early works in particular.For the majority of these earlier works, the difficulty of the content would be comparable to Shakespeare or Chaucer in English, definitely not for a beginner or even an intermediate learner. It certainly would be a good supplement to an advanced level literature class or simply to challenge yourself if you are fairly fluent, but if you are still building vocabulary or getting the grammar down you should wait until you are at a more advanced level before purchasing.

Exact literal translations of foreign languages often result in tortured English phrases that make it difficult to follow the story. Stanley Appelbaum is my LEAST favourite dual language editor.

The book arrived very quickly and in perfect condition. It is very useful as a studying tool. The Spanish writing is translated on the adjacent page in English so you do not have to check a dictionary or flip to the glossary for definitions. It also has a number of very interesting historical writings, fiction and non-fiction. However, the Spanish is not easy to read and is quite advanced, so if you are at an intermediate level in your Spanish you will be stumped, a lot.

I am addicted to Spanish readers and magazines. While I liked volume 1 better because it had the Spanish and English on opposite facing pages, I found the second reader to be aimed exactly at my amateur Spanish level.

I wrote this just to agree with the other reviewer who said this book is too difficult for a second reader. There should be a book out there that is somewhere between the first reader and this one.

For those who want to learn Spanish themselves at their convenience, this makes a great supplement and is what I use after completing Pimsleur and Rosetta Stone.

Good Book really is a second reader and not a first. Print is a little small but it is as advertised

à recommander chaudement à tout afficionado de l espagnol en particulier aux étudiants de la langue de cervantès ; toutefois les débutants risquent d etre déroutés par des textes souvent difficiles et parfois anciens , du répertoire classique ; à noter que la traduction en regard est très fignolée et le plus proche possible du texte original; manquent parfois quelques notes , cependant ces ouvrages sont top

While it's understandable that the editor wanted to present a range of genres and epochs, in doing so in such a slim volume he has dampened the effect that each entry could have otherwise had. Some selections are but a few paragraphs, frustratingly brief.A better choice is "New Penguin Parallel Text Short Stories In Spanish," in which entire, if short, pieces are presented, allowing you the satisfaction of beginning, middle, and end.

I was looking for everyday language and was let down by a book that is composed completely of antequated poetry and literature. Some of the lit was of value, but overall this book was a big disappointment.

This book turned out to be a great disappointment and of no use to me. It contains a lot of poetry and the stories are too long for my purpose (which is teaching SPanish. i wish I could return it and Mexican Short Stories.