Intensive Spoken Chinese [Chinese]

It's a very good book. Quality is very good. Worth a buy if you're teaching. Has a lot of sample dialogues. The approach on grammar is pretty nice. Good to use as a text book. Although it has old-fashioned Chinese in it that Chinese people today don't use anymore. Recommended as a textbook.

I got this book in Beijing at the start of a 2 year stint in China. It found it's way to a drawer and quickly became forgotten amid my new and exciting life. Several months later, when I re-discovered it, I kicked myself for not having used it earlier. It starts from the very beginning and doesn't require the reader to be able to read Chinese characters. However, for the student who wants to go the extra mile, the Chinese characters are included. That's also good for further down the road when a student begins to learn the characters, they can use this book as a reference to learn how to write and read already familar words and phrases. The topics are very useful and the dictionary in the back consisting of all words used in the book is very handy. For the serious student, I also recommend the companion books "The Most Common Chinese Radicals" and "Rapid Literacy in Chinese", although they won't be needed until after this book is completed.

Hi. I have never written a review for any item ever before online, but i am totally compelled to write one for this book. I am originally from NY, but i have been living in China on and off for 4.5 years. I now speak and read fluent Mandarin, but did not speak a word before i started traveling there. I run a small office in Shenzhen, China for my USA company. Although I studied for a short time in a school in Shanghai, I am basically self taught. This book is the best tool I ever had (the lonely planet guide to Mandarin Chinese is a very close second) This book takes you step by step through very basic phrases that you can actually go outside (to the chinese food take-out store if you're not in China!) and try out. Its great because it provides each phrase in Chinese charactres, Pinyin (Romanized Chinese), translated English, and along with a "V" "N" etc. to indicate the Verb, Noun, or other part of speech. It also then gives you vocabulary, so that you can use that phrase you just learned and subsitute in all different new words. (i.e. I like chocolate, I like cherries, I like fruit). Really, i can't recommend this book enough. The only downfall is although there is actually an accompanying tape recording...it's almost impossible to find in the market.