Starting to learn a new language, such as Italian, can be very exciting!
It can also suck.
You don’t understand anything that’s happening around you, and you can’t express yourself, perhaps not at all.
Your independence is stripped away, you’re reduced to being a helpless child again!
And it can feel as if the very language is conspiring against you, with its unrecognizable vocabulary, absurd irregular verbs and perverse pronunciation.
But once you’re a couple of years into the process, all that is just a memory.
The days when you were dumb and uncomprehending are long past.
Go you!
You may not yet understand EVERYTHING you hear (don’t worry, that’s normal.)
And your speech is still a little ‘rough and ready’…
But you get by.
Importantly, you are no longer isolated and uncertain.
If you ARE a beginner, know that early uncertainties pass.
Assuming you stick at it, of course.
So sit back and relax, enjoy the ride, which will be over all too soon…
Or if, by now, you’re already an old hand, then do take a moment to reflect on just how far you’ve come, how much you’ve achieved.
That can be very motivating.
Beh, anyway, this is all by way of introducing a new ebook easy reader, hot off the presses TODAY (so to speak) and live in our online shop since about an hour ago. 
Yue, a talented young Japanese from a rural community in Hokkaido, wins a one-year scholarship to study opera at the ‘Conservatorio’ in Bologna, home to Europe’s oldest university.
But the thought of leaving her parents and brother for a whole year disturbs her.
Worse, before studying at the ‘Conservatorio’, she’ll have to learn Italian…
Insomma, Yue gets ‘beginner blues’.
She’s a long way from home, surrounded by gibbering foreigners, and can’t understand what’s being said, or why.
She feels sad and alone, and tries hard to push away the thought that she’s made a terrible error…
- .pdf e-book (+ audio available free online at soundcloud.com)
- 8 very short chapters to read and listen to
- Comprehension questions to check your understanding
- Italian/English glossary of ‘difficult’ terms for the level
- Suitable for students at elementary level or above
- Download your Free Sample Chapter (.pdf)
- Your e-book will be emailed to you within 24 hours of your purchase
Get the free sample chapter (.pdf) to take a look at the level and complexity of the material, and to check it will work with the device you’d like to use it on.
The audio for the whole story, all eight chapters, is absolutely free for anyone to listen to, no purchase required.
You’ll find the link to the online audio at the top of Chapter 1 in the free sample .pdf file (also here below.)
In fact, if you already have a good level in Italian, why not take a half an hour today, and listen to the whole thing?
That said, having the full text, not just the sample chapter, is a help.
And this week, with the special launch promotion, you can get it for just £5.99, rather than the usual ebook easy reader price of £7.99 (that’s a 25% saving.)
- Buy ‘Yue a Bologna’
- Free sample chapter (.pdf)
- Just listen to the story (for free!)
- Or find material you prefer in our catalogue
P.S.
Talking of listening, have you heard Saturday’s Easy Italian News, yet?
If not, that’s an easy way to get some Italian in your skull today, fast and completely free.
There’ll be a new edition on Tuesday morning, then another on Thursday, and yet another on Saturday.
Sign up (also free) to receive each edition via email, as soon as it is published.
(Enter your email in the form in the side bar of the new website. You’ll find it center left, where it says ‘NEVER MISS ‘EASY ITALIAN NEWS’!’)