Reddit reviews Easy Italian Reader, Premium 2nd Edition: A Three-Part Text for Beginning Students (Easy Reader Series)

Graded readers?

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https://www.amazon.com/Easy-Italian-Reader-Premium-2nd/dp/0071849831

https://www.amazon.com/Letture-Varie-Graded-Italian-Readers/dp/B003HFYYAM

https://www.amazon.com/First-Italian-Reader-Dual-Language-Language/dp/0486465357

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I almost bought this last week, but can't justify the cost right now (I'm working at a pretty slow pace so probably can't rent it). I ended up buying two other books:

1. Practice Makes Perfect: Complete Italian Grammar
   
2. Easy Italian Reader
   
   They're being delivered today so I'm not sure if they live up to the reviews; I can update my thoughts on them later.
   
   EDIT
   
   These are my first thoughts after working through the first few pages of each book.
   
   

• Practice Makes Perfect: Seems like it's going to be great as a general overview, and the review questions are actually tolerable unlike the countless French homework assignments I suffered through in high school. It's hard to judge at the moment because I've already been using Duolingo for a while so obviously the first few chapters are going to be pure review for me.
  
  
• Easy Italian Reader: This book focuses more on reading passages; after reading small chunks of text you read and answer questions completely in Italian, and so far this is exactly what I was looking for; something that would allow me to practice reading stories and passages in Italian without being forced to read young children's books (hoping to read the first Harry Potter book in the near future). It's a bit dry (the first story focuses on two friends and their school life and whatnot), but I think it's perfect for someone who wants to start reading Italian early in their studies.

Firstly, I'd like to recommend the EdX series as a well-designed MOOC that covers 4 semesters of Italian: Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced, and then Advanced Placement (bridge program to "content" courses).

Really, any introductory college textbook will work. I've used:

• Ciao!
  
• Italiano in Diretta
  
• Avanti
  
• Oggi In Italia
  
  I think I liked Oggi most, but it's been a while since I've seen any of these. I'd also supplement it with a reader and lessons on italki.