Croatian

Today's Republic of Croatia is a crescent-shaped country with its northern arm stretching from the border with Serbia in the east to the border with Italy in the west before turning south down the coast of the Adriatic Sea.

Between 7 and 8 million tourists visited Croatia last year, most attracted by the Mediterranean atmosphere of its old towns like Zadar, Split and Dubrovnik, and the number has been steadily growing since peace returned to the region at the end of 1995.

Croatian is one of the family of Slavonic languages.

It is very close to Serbian and they were formerly regarded as one language - Serbo-Croat - although most native speakers now recognise differences which are not only of a linguistic but also of a cultural nature.

They remain mutually comprehensible as the standard forms of language spoken across most of today's Bosnia, Croatia, Montenegro and Serbia. "Teach Yourself Croatian" starts with the basics but moves at a lively pace to give you a good level of understanding, speaking and writing.

You will have lots of opportunity to practise the kind of language you will need to be able to communicate with confidence and understand Croatian culture. The book contains a pronunciation guide, a two-way vocabulary and a 'taking it further' section to direct you to further sources of Croatian.

Two accompanying CDs are also available separately (0 340 84626 7) or in a pack with the book (0 340 84625 9).