My current pipe-dream is to travel to Georgia or Khazakstan to learn Georgian or Khazak. As they are formerly part of the USSR, I would like to review my Russian to serve as a bridge language.
I took Russian nearly 30 years ago and have remembered a decent amount (considering the time that has passes). 12 semester hours.
My disntinct impression is that classroom Russian is not, in general, particularlyg good at giving you conversational colloquial Russian. (Thin, for a parallel, how studying Caesar and Cicero would not have prepared you for visits to the Fourth Century Roman Empire.) That;s intended as cautionary – the best textbook may need to be supplemented by something that gives you familiarity with colloquial use.
There are few classroom language experiences that can get you going. When I took Spanish, I learned enough to get me started then moved to SA. I got the classroom Chinese, but the wife was against moving to China. I understand the mechanics of really learning a language. There is ordering in a restaurant and then there is waking up in the middle of the night, negotiating a taxi ride, not getting taken to the cleaners and getting the directions right.
The issue with Russian, at least when I took it, was that it was during the EVIL EMPIRE period. Well, Carter was still the president,… The problem was that there was no one with whom I could talk. There really weren’t Russians around me until the early 90’s and they were all over the place as post-docs.
So what I want is a text to refresh my grammar and vocabulary. I might have to chat on-line with my colleagues, but I have people to talk with.
When I was teaching myself Russian back before I went to Georgetown, the one book I liked the most was the New Penguin Russian Course. It’s as thorough as a college textbook but has a complete answer key in the back.
I used it back in the late '80s so there may have been some changes since I used it, but I would guess they’re mostly cosmetic rather than structural.
ETA: Get the Katzner dictionary they recommend as well. Best US English<>Russian dictionary I’ve run across.
Удачи!
Seconding the Katzner dictionary.