I have studied modern Irish off and on for many years, and I have found that this book is a marvellous workbook for the beginner in learning Irish. However, it is necessary to have a dictionary and a grammar book available as well as this one. This book is wonderful for those people who already have a few hundred words of Irish in their vocabulary and have a basic grasp of pronunciation.

This book is very simple in format. It contains a series of numbered lessons that slowly increase in complexity. Most of the lessons present a few new words, and then give advice concerning grammar in plain terms as well as some lessons that utilise the new terms.

The lessons build on all the previous lessons in the book, so the learning process is quite logical. Further into the book, the sentence structure becomes a little more complicated, but the bits of advice on usage and sentence formation are quite adequate if a beginner has a handy Irish grammar book nearby. Lessons are presented in English and Irish; do not worry about getting lost quickly. This is not an 'immersion' sort of text.

There is a glossary of Irish terms used in the text located in the rear part of the book. Nouns are noted with their proper gender, which is helpful at a beginner's level.

The only real lack of information in this book is a guide to pronunciation or sample phonetic transcriptions. However, that data is very easily found in this Irish dictionary:

Foclóir Póca (Focloir Poca in Anglicised letters)
publisher: An Gúm (An Gum in Anglicised letters)
ISBN: 9781857910476
latest edition: 1992

The Foclóir Póca is available at many different bookshops online, though it has to be bought used rather than new these days. Each headword in the dictionary has an approximated pronunciation oriented toward English speakers. ( )