I cannot say enough about Bescherelle: La Conjugaison pour tous. This wonderful little book is INVALUABLE. It is the ONLY reference you will ever need to learn how to conjugate all 12,000 verbs of the French language.The first part of the book are the Tables of Conjugations, which show by examples all 85 unique forms of conjugated verbs in all the tenses and moods -- these include all the irregular verbs as well as those verbs which vary slightly from the regular forms. In the back of the book is an alphabetical listing of the 12,000 verbs, each with a reference to which of the 85 forms they follow when conjugated. Anywhere where the conjugation is irregular or the stem has changed (for example, the accent is changed), or there are differences in certain persons (e.g. the nous and vous persons), these warnings are printed in red to call the reader's attention to them. Bescherelle takes the extra step of listing as an individual form for certain verbs which may cause doubt. For example, take the verb "apprecier" (accent accute on the first e), which has its own page listing instead of under "aimer". This verb is in fact a regular -er verb and can be conjugated just like "aimer". However, because of the "i" in the stem before the "er", the student may be confused or even forget to keep the "i" when adding an ending such as "ions" in the imperfect tense. Therefore, in the conjugation "nous appreciions", the double ii's are printed in RED to call our attention to them. This is just one of the many things I love about this book.
Additionally, Bescherelle is beautifully typeset in color and is visually pleasing. It is amazing that they managed to pack so much information into each page, yet the condensed information is not tiring to the eyes. And as if this isn't enough, you would be surprised to discover just how small and compact the book is! It weighs less than a pound (I think) and is relatively thin, unlike other references that weigh a ton because of the conjugations of multiple verbs that are conjugated in the same way -- in my opinion this just adds to unnecessary extra pages. And why have only 500 verbs in a reference book, for example, when it is more than likely that one will come across many more verbs that are not listed in the reference?
The middle part of the book is a section on grammar and is the one part of the book that I haven't read yet because it is all in French, and although I'm at a level now where I can read French, I'm not quite ready to delve into the technical stuff yet. (For grammar, I have a separate comprehensive reference with explanations in English.) This does lead me to my last point: that you should get the all French version instead of the English one, even if you are a beginner, because you don't need to know any French to figure out how to use the Conjugation Tables and listing. I have used Bescherelle ever since I was a beginner and was able to conjugate verbs very early on even without knowing much about the explanations. This book will carry you through to the advance level and beyond, at which point you can decide to tackle the French grammatical explanations if you would like. With so many books already explained in English, it is a good opportunity to read some French technical text. This version is a real French book printed in France. But keep in mind that I'm recommending this book for the conjugation; and besides, Bescherelle (La Grammaire pour tous) as well as others have separate books on grammar that are probably more comprehensive. But of course, get the English version if you will be more comfortable.
So, to conclude, I recommend "La Conjugaison pour tous" highly to all students at all levels of study. Now...if only there is a similar version for Italian!
