Learn to speak Spanish the way it is actually spoken in Spain.

Most Spanish courses teach a Spanish that belongs nowhere in particular — and then leave you to discover on arrival in Madrid, Seville or Bilbao that nobody around you talks like that. This book is different. It teaches European Spanish exclusively: coche and not carro, móvil and not celular, ordenador and not computadora, and the vosotros forms you will hear every single day in Spain and almost nowhere else.

Written for complete beginners, it is built around real situations rather than grammar drills. Every phrase is given four ways — English, Spanish, an easy pronunciation guide written for English speakers, and a short note on when to use it — so you always know not just what to say but how to say it and whether it fits the moment.

What's inside

49 chapters covering greetings, everyday expressions, questions, numbers, money, dates and time
A full European Spanish pronunciation guide, including the distinción heard across most of Spain, with clear respellings and no intimidating phonetic symbols
Realistic dialogues in every major chapter — travellers and locals, customers and waiters, patients and pharmacists, tenants and landlords, colleagues, neighbours and friends
Practical grammar, explained only where it helps you speak: ser and estar, por and para, hay versus está, gustar, and the tenses you actually need
Travel chapters on directions, city transport, trains, taxis, airports, hotels and sightseeing
Food and shopping, from ordering a caña at the bar to reading a menú del día, with honest notes on regional variation
Living in Spain — work, telephone calls, email and messaging, appointments, banks, administrative offices and renting a flat
Health and emergencies, including the phrases you cannot look up when you need them
Exercises, answers and role-plays in every chapter
Quick-reference sections: survival phrases, 100 essential phrases, 250 essential words, English↔Spanish word lists, common mistakes and false friends

Who it's for

Travellers and tourists, students, people moving to Spain, expats, business travellers, professionals working with Spanish colleagues, and anyone who simply prefers the Spanish of Spain.

Cultural notes throughout describe how things actually work — meal times, formality, tipping, queuing, the sobremesa — while being careful to present tendencies rather than stereotypes, and to acknowledge that Spain is a linguistically and culturally varied country.

No previous Spanish required. Start on page one, or open the book at the situation in front of you.