An Ultimate source for Learning English

Special attention: Mr. Arbabi Radi

Sorry for the delay. Here are the books you asked for!

Listening: Usually listening is practiced along with speaking in major English books. Yet a very useful book with mere attention to listening is Tactics for listening. The series include Basics, developing and Expanding. These seem to be extremely useful for listening practice written by JC Richards and they are available with cassettes in the market!

Idioms: There are a number of books on English idioms. Here are the most popular ones. The most well-known book on idioms is English Idioms in Use by McCarthy & O’dell published by Cambridge University is comprehensive book for intermediate and upper intermediate students. It includes over 1000 of the most useful and frequent idioms.

Practising Idioms by Donald Watson published by Nelson is another helpful book on idioms which has been categorized based on topics.  The idioms are contextualized in interesting mini-stories and dialogues. 

Both of the above are workbooks with lots of exercise for practising. Of course both have to be used along with dictionaries. Remember there are not reference books for finding idioms.

101 American English Idioms  is a small but interesting book on idioms which contains a number of idioms contextualized in examples along with their meanings. What gives the book a funny look and makes idioms easy to remember is the funny caricature accompanying each idiom!

A domestically compiled book on idioms is Categorized Idiomatic Expressions in English  by Javad Riasati & Samad Zare. It seems easy to use since it is alphabetically organized and it includes the meanings as well.