Firefly Spanish/English Visual Dictionary

My wife's primary language is Spanish, and she is learning English. My situation is the reverse of hers. My language by birth is English, and I am learning Spanish.

The Firefly Spanish/English Visual Dictionary is an indispensable book for both of us. It is so richly illustrated and well-organized that after using it, we have conveniently misplaced our other less visually-stimulating dictionaries.

The cool thing about this dictionary is that it is made by the same company that has also produced a popular reference book called The Concise Encyclopedia. Like Webster's Dictionary, this book is helpful to have around the household. It serves the purpose of a dictionary, yet is not burdened with lengthy descriptions of the things you wish to know about. Rather than describing these objects, The Concise Encyclopedia presents you with imaginatively-diagrammed pictures of the object. For example, let's presume that you want to understand terms used in the industry of aircraft construction. Instead of needing to research a stack of literature on the subject to locate relevant terms, you can simply find a picture of an airplane in The Concise Encyclopedia and study the terms that you find surrounding the picture.

The Firefly Spanish/English Visual Dictionary advances this same type of concept. It includes realistic, computer-generated illustrations that are marvelously lifelike. This dictionary is quite pioneering in this respect. Other illustrated dictionaries usually include cartoonish illustrations that are not intended to be accurate so much as they are intended to amuse you. However, the publishers of this dictionary have obviously gone through painstaking efforts to create illustrations so realistic that they almost pop off the page.