Short Stories in Arabic for Intermediate Learners (Teach Yourself)

It’s very good especially when you combine it with the audio version. The only thing I would say to improve it would be to make the font size a little bit bigger. Otherwise it’s great for intermediates.

To determine which vocabulary words should go in the glossary, the author should have asked himself: which roots are difficult to find in the standard Hans Weir dictionary, i.e. roots that have several possibilities and take time to look up. Those roots he should have included in his glossary. Some easy roots like chabar in form 4, he includes in it. But he neglects to include some words that are difficult for an Intermediate Arabic learner.The main problem with an "intermediate" reader is rating the words in your stories by levels of difficulty. There are vocabulary lists that define beginning to advanced learners. If you make the read too difficult, you frustrate your customers, and if they are too frustrated, they might curse you (or bless you if they're not). These stories toddle somewhere between frustation and enjoyment. The author might dismiss my criticism by saying that I am not yet qualified to be rated intermediate. But I know that I am.It's not just vocabulary that could use refining, but some notes would have helped to define ambiguous passages, such as the first two words of page 31. Waqa'a has many meanings There are several possibilities to translate the first few words. Give us a note to guide us a little. Not anticipating intermediate problems is a kind of blindness on the part of the author.For my frustration, I rated this book down from five to three stars. In the end, my rating might be higher as my frustration subsides. But who likes to be frustrated when it's not necessary?

The author sent out an email blast saying that even though this book says « for intermediate learners », that beginners could find it useful as well. This is patently untrue as the texts are not vowelized. If you are able to read mostly w/o harakat, then buy this book. If you are level A1-B1, don’t waste your money.