You may have already seen the two previous reviews of the goodies sent to me by Tuttle Publishing? Well, today it’s time to review their Concise Japanese Dictionary. Also, there’s a little giveaway of two copies at the end of this blog post so if you fancy it, you can also win yourself a copy of the dictionary. It’s go time.

How does a Japanese dictionary work?

In a couple of ways. Having a different script doesn’t restrict using a dictionary as much as you might first think. Before being sent this book, I was already the proud owner of three Japanese dictionaries. I didn’t buy any of these, they were all gifts – and all gifts before I really started learning Japanese! Here’s a little book porn for you…

Ahem. Now the Pocket dictionary and the little red one use the Latin alphabet in both the Japanese to English and English to Japanese sides. This is great but they’re only little. So they serve their purpose as a quick reference but when I needed a bigger word, I’d often refer to the Oxford one instead, which is bigger and beefier and has more words in it. Yeeeah. However, one slight problem. Both sides of the dictionary use hiragana for the Japanese words. This is great if you’re looking from English to Japanese, but if you hear a word in Japanese and want to find it in the dictionary? Good luck if you’re a beginner with this one dictionary. So, none of these dictionaries were really all encompassing – quick, easy, and effective.

How does this one work?

The Tuttle Concise Dictionary, the one we’re looking at today, works with the Latin alphabet on both sides. This is perfect for quickly finding a word you’ve just heard. When you look up a word in Japanese, you’re shown the romaji and then the hiragana, katakana or kanji depending on the word. From English to Japanese you see the romaji as well. In that respect, I’ve found this dictionary really handy when quickly wanting to find a word for the Instagram Language Challenge.

What else is nice?

This is going to sound really lame but I’m going to go ahead and say it. It’s a nice dictionary to hold. I’m cringing right now. It’s flexible as if you’ve had it for years, but it’s also solid, and crisp, and new – and it’s the perfect size for taking to classes or popping in your bag. It also is nicely presented and more thorough than the other smaller dictionaries I had used previously.

I want one!

You can have one! Tuttle have very kindly offered up 2 copies of the Concise Japanese Dictionary to readers of Lindsay Does Languages. (Psst! That’s you!) All you have to do is enter following the instructions in the Rafflecopter box below for multiple entries into the giveaway. Two winners will be picked at random on the 9th June. The draw closes at 23.59GMT on Monday 8th June.
a Rafflecopter giveaway

Have you used any Tuttle books? What do you think? Share your thoughts in the comments! If you comment, you’re instantly in with 5 chances of winning!