Exactly that: quick and simple.

The rate of learning is slow enought that you won't really need to press the pause button... contrary to what the back cover says, there is a lot of repetition of the same words involved - Pimsleur calls it "saturation". But they substitute words around where possible so you don't repeat the exact same phrase more than a few times in a row.

The first CD is very simple indeed. The whole 60 minutes is taken up with just a handful of phrases (english equivalent):

Do you speak? / do you understand? / I speak / a little / I speak a little spanish / you speak a little spanish / I don't speak / you don't speak english / no señorita / are you North American? / Yes señor / thankyou / how are you? / very good / good thanks / you speak spanish very well / good day...

That's about all the content there is on the first CD, but there are several variations of the theme -word substitution- so it is a very slow rate of learning.

In comparison, there is ~10 times as much content on virtually any of the other spanish audio CDs I have reviewed. According to the 3 CD set "Learn in your car spanish", that product conatins 600+ words. Whereas "Pimsleur quick & simple spanish" contains only 75 words.

The good news is- I don't think I'll *ever* forget these phrases now, I believe they've been firmly etched in my brain. I.e. permanently! But I had already been exposed to these words previously, so I found it all rather boring.

At this rate, I don't think I'll learn much more new information from the remaining CDs. Thus, I can only recommend this for people that know practically no spanish to begin with. Start here and follow up with other spanish audio products.

**UPDATE** OK I am half way through now, and I realise I am enjoying this course more than the all the others I have trialled --- for the simple reason that it is INTERACTIVE. It's like having a language teacher right there. The speaker asks you to compose new sentances based on the phrases taught previously. I think it is a very effective method.

Sure it is slow, but I think you can only learn & retain so many new words per day..... the good news is that Pimsleur makes sure they are CORE words. When I try to learn more words with other programs, I tend to forget them all too quickly. I am tempted to buy the full Pimsleur course, even though I already have 35+ hours of otehr spanish CDs to get through!!

--- I'D GIVE IT FIVE STARS NOW ---

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INTERNATIONAL SHIPPING:
I was *extremely impressed* with Amazon's "Priority International Courier" shipping option. I ordered several spanish books + CDs and wanted them here so that I could start learning spanish ASAP, as my trip to Tenerife + South America is in a month's time. I placed the order on thursday night; it was well after midnight here in Australia (local time). I got both parcels on Monday afternoon! Absolutely Incredible!! I order stuff from the USA all the time, and this is definitely the speediest service I have ever encountered. Thanks Amazon!

Great way to get started w/ Spanish & Pimsleur

This set will give you a pretty good idea of the Pimsleur method. You can read more about their approach on pimsleur.com
From what I hear, don't expect to finish all 3 levels of their Spanish programs and be fluent. Each Spanish-speaking country has their own variation on words. But this should be a good foundation.

Good for the Money but Behind the Wheel Spanish is Better

Pimsleurs' Spanish Quick and Simple is a good value for the money but I still returned it beacause I wanted to make my own original sentences and create 'original' communication in Spanish and Behind the Wheel Spanish was the only course I found that accomplished this for me beautifully.
Besides not including sentence building techniques and idioms I found several other problems with the this Pimsleur course. For example, if you 'tune in' to just ten minutes to pick up a little vocabulary, then youve 'missed' the graduated interval recall which is key to this method.
Some people (like myself for example) are just too busy to stay with their ears and mouths glued to a foreign language program for a half hour no matter what. There are no tracks to jump aournd a bit for quick review either. You must therefore, 'follow the program' or else you will be driving with your finger on the fast forward button. And remember, you miss the benefit of the two Pimsleur 'Principles' if you dare to be
spontaneous.
Also... If you're a visual learner or if (heaven forbid) you should wish to learn to read and write a bit of the language, then you're simply out of luck. This mehtod and course provides no written materials and is 100% audio.