DO. YOU. READ. ENGLISH?

+++

Buondì.

When an article like this one gets picked up by our expensive bulk mailing system to be sent to the tens of thousands of people who have chosen to receive club news, promotions (scroll down), and NAGS ABOUT MAKING THE MOST OF OUR FREE MATERIAL (see below, and the P.S.), quite often someone will reply, in Spanish, something like “no hablo ingles”.

Years back I got bored of asking them why they filled in a form IN ENGLISH to receive email communications IN ENGLISH. These days I just sigh, and unsubscribe them.

More irritating than that is the woman – I won’t mention her name – who subscribed to one or other of our lists using an email account on which she’s set up an auto-responder message, which replies something like “I rarely check this email so if it’s important, please phone me instead.”

Every time I send a bulk email to whichever list that is, that autoresponder message pops into my inbox seconds later. Va bene, at least I know the bulk mailiing got sent.

But unlike banks and so on, who are supposedly customer-focused, hah hah, I never use ‘no reply’ emails to communicate with people, so actually do see – and read – any responses. If you have a stupid auto-responder message, be aware that someone far away is muttering curses at you while you’ve relaxing ‘out of office’.

Back in the day, that’s to say before the European Union’s latest data protections, I at least had the satisfaction of knowing that tot percentage of the tens of thousands of club members received/opened the emailed article.

But now that no longer happens. There’s no legit way of knowing. Bulk mailing these days is like dropping a stone down a very deep, dark well, then listening for the splash. Which doesn’t come.

A common response to ‘club’ emails (like this one) is a brief phrase, perhaps in English, often not, saying something like:

“I want to learn Italian”.

Wow, you amaze me, I exclaim sarcastically. So what’s stopping you? Idiot.

So, just to restate how the club works, for the thousands of you who weren’t paying attention when you chose to receive articles like this one via email:

1.) Everything on the club website is free.

2.) You don’t need to be a ‘member’ to access it. There are no user names, no login processes, no passwords.

3.) Use the website in any way you wish, free, with no restriction on time, approach, level, and so on.

4.) But PEOPLE BEING PEOPLE (and I am a person, too), they’ll discover a good resource online, make plans to go back and profit from it, but never do. Mea culpa.

5.) Hence the emailed articles: a weekly reminder to get your act together, plus often an attempt to sell you something (see below) so we can pay the club’s bills. We’re currently making a loss, which is a bore.

All this is actually explained to people in advance, for instance on the website’s Join page.

But people don’t read any longer. Especially now with AI offering to summarise emails for people.

I got a warning last week, from a company that provides useful bits and pieces for website owners – to do with sending emails, I won’t bore you with the details.

Basically they were saying that the AI in iPhones will now be reading the emails that marketers (and language educators) send out, which people have actively chosen to receive, presumably to save iPhone owners from having to exercise their brains/waste time on Daniel’s drivel.

(Holds up middle finger.)

Summarise this, Apple.

OK, so that’s the rant.

Now, dear reader, for if you have got this far, you are evidently one of the few readers left, so dear to me, here’s the NAG part.

In every, single club email I remind people in the P.S. (scroll right down past the promotion to verify this) that reading and listening to Italian will speed up your learning, especially your comprehension skills, which I know from thirty-plus years of language teaching that the majority of learners neglect.

And that you can do that for free at our other website EasyItalianNews.com.

Yesterday I was browsing their numbers for August and I noticed that fewer and fewer people are signing up for the three free emailed bulletins they publish and email out each week.

That’s AI again, probably. The world is going to hell in a handbasket.

But, BUT, I thought…

There are approximately thirty-five thousand club members. People who are supposedly learning Italian, yet less than half that number of EasyItalianNews.com subscribers.

This is not for want of nagging.

The probable explanation is that people are dumb about language-learning, believing (tell me it’s not so, Joe) that FIRST I NEED TO LEARN ALL THE GRAMMAR. THEN, I WILL READ, LISTEN AND SPEAK.

Which is total nonsense, as I proved to club members years back by learning Swedish (their choice) and demonstrating that regular listening, reading and speaking will reliably get you from zero to hero.

I listen to Swedish most days, chat to a native speaker most weeks, and can claim (approximately) to be an autonomous user of the language (i.e. B1-B2), having hardly ever visited the country and barely having studied the language at all, perhaps just a few weeks of incomprehensible grammar at the start.

Practice + Time = Learning

Reading & listening to the language you hope to master is also not boring, so easy to build into a habit which is sustainable over time.

Yesterday I had an email from someone who’s bought various of our ‘easy reader’ ebooks (see promotion below), and read them, but never thought to listen to the online audio which, for best results should be used together with the written text.

When he finally decided to give it a go, it was much too fast!!

Beh, è così.

Neglect the skills work and the result will be that you won’t be able to understand what people say to you, or enjoy and learn from online media.

Your bad.

Did I mention that EasyItalianNews.com is completely free?

Did I mention that less than half of people receiving this emailed article are profiting from it?

I rest my case. Consider yourself nagged.

Alla prossima settimana!

2026 Back to School Sale! ‘Easy reader’ ebook picks at your level

Last Monday we announced that our 2026 ‘Back to School’ Sale had begun. Find out more here.

So today, as part of this promotion, I’m going to give you my top ebook picks for beginner, intermediate, and advanced-learners of Italian – I hope there’ll be something here that grabs you!

When I say ‘my top picks’, what I mean is the ebooks that I have enjoyed the most (I read them all, multiple times, during the editing and publishing process).

My criteria is just that: enjoyment. Why?

Because as a language-learner myself, I find that if there’s a story that engages me (whether it’s a news article, or fiction, like our ‘easy readers’), I’ll keep turning the page.

And if I can’t (metaphorically) put an ebook down, my reading comprehension skills improve, and with them my knowledge of vocabulary, and my confidence with the grammar of the language I’m learning.

As any teacher (or student) knows, boredom is the enemy! So a writer that knows how to craft a text so that it pulls you in and won’t let go, even if it’s ‘just’ language-study material, is indeed a useful ally!

Don’t forget, the 2026 Back to School Sale is on! To get 25% off everything in your shopping cart, copy/paste the coupon code, which is:

2026-Back-to-School-25%-Off

Bene, let’s get to it. I’m on the Catalog page of our online shop, starting a little way down, where it says ‘Italian Easy Readers’ (if you’re learning another language, you’ll need to scroll down the Catalog page and make your own selections, sorry!)

So we have seventeen easy reader ebooks for A1 and A2 students, six at A1 (the lowest level), eight at the ‘half-level’ A1/2, and three at A2 (the harder ones). If you’re not sure which level is right for you, use the Free Sample links and take a look. You should be able to get the gist of the story with only occasional use of a dictionary.

N.b. This article was written a couple of years ago. Since then we’ve published other ebooks, so the selection at your level is probably even more ample than described below. Our Catalog page is always up-to-date, so includes the most recent titles, and free sample chapters!

So honestly? I enjoyed all seventeen. but I’ve been strict with myself and whittled the total down to just two at each level, concentrating on the ones I liked the MOST – the stories that made me actually care about the characters, and about what happened to them next!

(These are extracts from our Catalog page, so you can also see the price, the available formats, and a link to the free sample chapter for each title…)

A1

Colpo di forbici (A1) £9.99 Download FREE sample (.pdf, .epub, .mobi/Kindle)
Rosa la cuoca disastrosa (A1) £9.99 Download FREE sample (.pdf, .epub, .mobi/Kindle)

A1/2

Il giocoliere (A1/2) £9.99 Download FREE sample (.pdf, .epub, .mobi/Kindle)
L’ascensore (A1/2) £9.99 Download FREE sample (.pdf, .epub, .mobi/Kindle)

A2

Cielo libero (A2) £9.99 Download FREE sample (.pdf, .epub, .mobi/Kindle)
L’amore ai tempi del supermercato (A2) £9.99 Download FREE sample (.pdf, .epub, .mobi/Kindle)

What if those were too easy for you? Nessun problema. For ‘intermediate’ learners we have loads and loads of materials – twenty-two separate titles!

The hard part was choosing between them, but again, I’ve been strict and narrowed it down to two stories at each half level…

A2/B1

2 giugno 1946 (A2/B1) £9.99 Download FREE sample (.pdf, .epub, .mobi/Kindle)
Il campo di papaveri (A2/B1) £9.99 Download FREE sample (.pdf, .epub, .mobi/Kindle)

B1

Caccia all’autografo (B1) £9.99 Download FREE sample (.pdf, .epub, .mobi/Kindle)
Dante, gatto vagante (B1) £9.99 Download FREE sample (.pdf, .epub, .mobi/Kindle)

B1/B2

L’imperatore e i giochi (B1/2) £9.99 Download FREE sample (.pdf, .epub, .mobi/Kindle)
Segreti e polpette (B1/2) £9.99 Download FREE sample (.pdf, .epub, .mobi/Kindle)

B2

Natale a sorpresa (B2) £9.99 Download FREE sample (.pdf, .epub, .mobi/Kindle)
Le italiane (B2) £9.99 Download FREE sample (.pdf, .epub, .mobi/Kindle)

Hope there was something there that called out “Read me!”

But if you looked at the sample chapters and they were STILL to simple for you, firstly, well done for reading Italian for such confidence, and secondly, brace yourself now for the hard stuff!

Bene. Hope you found lots that will keep you reading in and listening to Italian this autumn/fall!

The prices marked above are the usual, year-round prices but with the 2026 ‘Back to School’ promotion (which ends on Sunday September 13th 2026) everything in our online store (EasyReaders.org) is 25% cheaper!

Copy and paste the coupon code 2026-Back-to-School-25%-Off into your shopping cart, then scroll down to check the cart total has been reduced by 25%.

Make your selections today!

EasyReaders.org

N.b. Check out the ‘easy reader’ ebook MULTIPACKS, which get you a three-for-two deal, or better.

AND the 25% discount!

Assuming you remember to use the coupon code, that is…

2026-Back-to-School-25%-Off

P.S.

And here’s an ineffective reminder to read/listen to Tuesday’s bulletin of news from EasyItalianNews.com.

You know, the club has something like thirty-five THOUSAND ‘members’? Yet EasyItalianNews.com has less than half of that number of subscribers?

Reading/listening practice will help you consolidate the Italian you’re studying, expand your vocabulary, and build vital comprehension skills.

EasyItalianNews.com is FREE to read/listen to.

Subscribing, and so receiving all three text + audio bulletins of ‘easy’ news via email each week – on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays – is also FREE.

Just enter your email address on this page and click the confirmation link that will be sent to you.

SO HOW COME SO FEW CLUB MEMBERS ARE DOING THIS????

+++

OnlineItalianClub.com | EasyItalianNews.com | Shop (ebooks) | Shop (online lessons)

OnlineFrenchClub.com | OnlineSpanishClub.com | OnlineGermanClub.com

+++

No longer interested?

All bulk emails we send (including this one) contain an unsubscribe link, usually at the bottom. Scroll down to find it, click the link and select ‘unsubscribe’. That will permanently remove your email address from our mailing list.

Comments

Linn Harrar says

September 2, 2026 at 12:51 pm

I always look forward to your emails. I love your rants because they are so true! I have found listening to the ebooks very helpful. Your email also remind that I have a couple more to listen to. I always listen to the first and then I listen again as I read it. I find listening to the Easy Italian News very helpful. I highly recommend your site.

- Daniel says
  
  September 2, 2026 at 1:21 pm
  
  That’s kind, Linn, thank you!
  
Mayken says

September 2, 2026 at 5:54 pm

Hi Daniel!
I’m totally with what Linn says above except I don’t listen to the ebooks. I mean to get back to the history audios some dax, I think I dropped out somewhere in the Middle Ages but I’m listening to a regular Italian news podcast these days in addition to EIN (where I pick up lots of new vicabulary!), and that eats all my Italian listening time.
But I love rwading your e-mails and highly recommend the website!
Cheers,
Mayken

DO. YOU. READ. ENGLISH?