Review of A Handbook of Japanese Usage by Mark Barton

A reference, in dictionary format, for a very large number (750+) of prefixes, suffixes, particles and auxiliary verbs. The target audience is advanced students (two years or more), and it has good coverage of obscure, old-fashioned and archaic forms. This is either a waste of space or exactly what you want. There may be a steep learning curve for some because it uses Japanese grammatical concepts and terminology (explained in the introduction, e.g., "ren'youkei") rather than what is commonly used in introductory courses in English ("-masu stem" etc). All of the examples and most of the explanation are given in Japanese, romanized Japanese and English.

☆ See all reviews by Mark Barton.