Hey everyone,

ich hoffe, euch geht’s gut :). So there’s something I could use your help with.
Two things actually – a review and then
this blob.
Oh… I mean this BLOG, but man, this cat really needs help, too.

Anyway, let’s start with the review stuff…

Help me review “Interlinear Books”

What is Interlinear books?
Well, the idea is really simple. Most of you probably know these bilingual books where you have one language on the one side and the translation on the other. Well, in interlinear books you get a line by line translation. But not a “normal” translation. You  get a word for word translation. So you have a German sentence structure, just with English words. Like so:

• Ich habe heute eine halbe Pizza gegessen.
• I      have    today    a        half     pizza     eaten.

Now some of you might be like “Wait a minute Emanuel, didn’t you already tell us about that 3 years ago?!?!?!”
And yes, I almost forgot it myself, but I actually did do a review. But I wanna do it again.
Why? Well, my first review is REALLY hard to find as it is kind of hidden at the bottom of a hidden article.
But what’s more important is that I reviewed it back then. But I, Emanuel, doesn’t exist. It is a concept your unconscious has made up; an imaginary friend that helps you not to go crazy over learning German. Yes, that’s right… you had to crazy, not to go crazy. Man, what kind of red wine is that? I feel really weird. Who am I?  Where were we… oh… oh wait, yeah, right. Interlinear books.  So I did review Interlinear Books but the thing is… I’m actually not that qualified because I don’t have to learn German. I’m not learning any language in the present decade … I mean moment. Of course, I can have an opinion but I can’t really tell whether it is any good.
YOU GUYS CAN. 
For me, Interlinear Books was a mixed bag back then, but I do like the idea because it’s something new, and when the people contacted me again now, I felt like I really wanted to get YOUR opinion as language learners.
So that’s why I am looking for two of you as test readers.

There’s one title available in German at the moment: Franz Kafka’s “Die Verwandlung”, which a classic of German literature, by the way.
As a test reader, you’ll get a copy for free (it costs $20) and in turn I’d like you to write a short review.

• How did you like it?
• What were the downsides, what the ups?
• Do you think it’s helpful, and why?
• Would you recommend it?
  

If that sounds interesting to you and you’d love to be a reviewer then here’s what you have to do:

 Leave a comment and complete the hashtag #Iwant____ .

Kafka’s stuff is pretty random sometimes, so the two most random answers will get the chance to review the book/tool.
UPDATE: CONTEST IS OVER!! Sorry :)
Here’s the link to Interlinear books for more information and a snippet of the product:

Interlinear Books on the Web

And here’s the link to the article that contains my review from 2014 :)

• QAS 1 – Review Interlinear Books

It’s toward the bottom of the post.

All right. So this is the first thing I need your help with. And the second one is… drumroll please….

Improving this blog

There are close to 400 articles here and I’m still gonna add more. But recently, I feel like devoting more energy to improving the stuff that is already there.
One aspect is to review older articles, edit them and trim some fat. Or a lot of fat sometimes.
But that’s just the basics. Here’s some more ideas:

• adding more audio (it’s about 120 article with audio right now)
• adding exercises to certain articles (especially the ones of the course)
• adding a summary box at the end of an article
• connect some sort of vocabulary training app so you can build a Yourdailygerman-deck as you read

I can’t do all of that at once and I’m sure there’s more ideas  so I’d really love to hear from you what you think would be the most helpful for you as a learner?  Is it audio? A summary? Exercises? Vocabulary? What’s a good app for vocabulary learning?
Let me know in the comments. And also… do you have any wishes about the layout and usability of the site?
I won’t be able to do everything until I my plan of creating a minion army from empty beer bottles finally works but I really appreciate any input and inspiration you have.
So go wild in the comments :).

And don’t forget complete the hashtag #iwant___ with the most random thing possible if you want to win a copy of Interlinear Book and review it.
I’m really looking forward to reading from you!!!!
Eine tolle Woche wünsch ich euch, und bis bald :)