From the blurb: "L'anglais
britannique et américain d'aujourd'hui: Ce livre apporte des réponses
claires et précises aux problèmes ponctuels
auxquels toute personne qui apprend l'anglais est confrontée un jour ou
l'autre. La présentation sous forme de fiches classées par ordre
alphabétique permet au lecteur de sérier ses problèmes
et de les traiter un à un."
As you
might have guessed, this book in written in French and is aimed at
teenagers and older students studying English seriously, as well as all
French speakers who like to have explanations and translations of our
wonderfully tricky language in their native tongue.
The
grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation points are presented in the form
of 303 sections in 'alphabetical' order, although the headings are
somewhat haphazard, with French and English grammatical terms rubbing
shoulders with normal words (the section 'Past Perfect' follows the 'Passif',
and is itself followed by 'Pay' which is followed by 'Pendant, pendant
que' and so on).
The units range in
length from half a page to two pages, and many finish with a useful
little consolidation exercise with answers at the end of the book.
The detail is impressive
and sometimes dense, but intelligent subsections keep the explanations
clear and readable.
The
Guide alphabétique de l'anglais is obviously a reference book, to
be referred to when authoritative explanations are needed, in French, of
specific difficulties in English, and in this it succeeds admirably.
It's also one of those books which is strangely fascinating just to
flick through and stumble on a point at random and see what they have to
say about it.
The examples are
well-chosen and a couple of sections such as 'Mots Tabous' (taboo words)
are admirably explicit, making the naughty school boy in me smile!
All in all, the Guide
alphabétique de l'anglais is a well-informed and very complete
volume covering many aspects of what it is to be a motivated
French-speaking English learner today.
Guide
alphabétique de l'anglais
