Let’s face it: There’s no time like the present to learn English. It’s the world’s most widely spoken language. It permeates nearly every aspect of our daily lives. Mastering pronunciation, figures of speech, and idioms are just a few of the challenges students may face.

Even so, learning to actually use American English comfortably isn’t among the easiest of tasks, Author Jeannie Yang hopes to help with that. Numbered lessons and regimented exercises only serve to make an already daunting task seem impossible. They don’t help, so they aren’t welcome in this book. Professor Jeannie Yang has takes a new approach to learning conversational English—inviting you to the conversation!

Written in the form of a movie screenplay, these fictional scenarios innovatively invite you to actively engage in conversations on a variety of subjects and in a variety of settings. As you speak their words, you can imagine that you are one of the characters—and you’ll be learning at the same time.

You’ll meet

• Mi Hee—a sweet and spunky young woman from Korea who dreams of studying at an American university
• Kenny—an intellectual from Hong Kong who’s lived and studied in the United States for years
• Roy—Kenny’s best friend, whose liberal use of slang is in stark contrast to Kenny’s esoteric vocabulary

Whether you are going on a cruise or heading for a job interview, this book serves as a practical and entertaining guide to getting more comfortable with conversational American English.

Let’s face it. There’s no time like the present to learn English. The world’s most widely spoken language permeates nearly every aspect of our daily lives. Everything from internet sites, to blockbuster movies, to toothpaste tubes bears English words. But let’s be honest. Learning to speak American English isn’t among the easiest of tasks, at least for most of us. Pronunciation, sentence structures, figures of speech and idioms are just some of the potential headaches for those who are courageous enough to take up English. In light of this, one might wonder if there is a way to learn American English with minimum hassle. That’s exactly why this book was written.

Flipping through the pages of this book reveals the absence of numbered lessons and regimented exercises. In fact, the majority of the text is written in a format that is similar to a movie script. There is a cast of characters performing the actions of each scene. The two main characters of the story have different personalities and backgrounds, but they are united by the quest to learn English. Both of the characters drive the storyline by making decisions that are based on their learning goals. You have the opportunity to imagine that you are a character in the story. You can decide which parts of the text to read, and the order in which they are read, in accordance with your own learning goals.

Whether you are going on a cruise or heading for a job interview, this book serves as a practical and entertaining guide to conversational American English. You can read the text on the subway, in a hospital waiting room or for an English class. You can even use it as a handy reference, while traveling abroad. Although the events in the story take place in the United States, the speaking skills that you will gain can be employed in other English-speaking countries.

The lines of the characters in the story provide a glimpse into the diversity of dialects and rich vocabulary that American English has to offer. It is a dynamic language that is deeply intertwined with American culture. References to American thought, history and pop culture enliven the text, making for an enjoyable learning experience. As you make your way through the book, I hope you will come to see, as I have, how wonderful and exhilarating learning English can be.

Jeannie Yang, the author of twenty-seven books, is a professor at the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the University of California–Los Angeles (UCLA) and California State University–Northridge (CSUN). She has a PhD in biochemistry from Loma Linda University. She lives in Porter Ranch, California.