Italian Vocabulary

I spent a few weeks trying to learn some Italian in preparation for my Italian vacation; I found this book very helpful. It is not comprehensive, but it contains most of the words a traveler will need. Most of all, its unique organization makes it an indispensable study aid.This is a "categorized dictionary." That means words are found in very natural groupings like "Family and Friends," "The Body," "Quantity and Space," and so on. After all, if you want to know the Italian word for "left", you'll very likely want to know the words for "right", "front", "back", "up", "down", etc. So the book's organization makes it very easy to find a related group of words. There is also an "English-Italian Wordfinder" section that is more like a convention dictionary: look up an English word and find its Italian equivalent.The same author has written a book called "Italian Grammar" that may be of interest. The book is rather small, so it easily fits into a backpack or suitcase. The book as a sturdy binding and a plastic cover, so it can withstand the rigors of travel (take it with you!). My only gripe: I found a few places in the "English-Italian Wordfinder" section that had incorrect section number references back to the main text.