Teach Yourself Beginner's Chinese

I'm only about halfway (okay, not that far, even) through the book, and I've learned a lot. I've even had a couple of very short conversations with people in Chinese, and they've told me that I speak very well, so the book certainly does its job. The tapes are indispensible. The book covers pronunciation and the different tones very well. I've got a lot left to read, but I'm very, very happy with the course over all! I WOULDN'T buy it, though, as a new, updated version is coming out in the U.S. in January, I believe. For more information on that, go to:http://www.teachyourself.co.uk

The author is quite talented in the presentation of grammatical points. Her explanations of the structure of the language are intuitive and readable without being oversimplified or patronizing. This book contains a wealth of grammatical information, much more than other beginning books I have seen, and always clearly explained.Unfortunately, the book and tapes together contain only a small fraction of the amount of excercises, conversations, and other reinforcement that would be necessary to support the amount of vocabulary & grammar presented. The tapes are good, with a steadily increasing pace, but you would need more of them to really get practice at listening. The readings are modern, friendly and interesting, but they are lacking in volume. Chapters 7-11 (out of 22) have such a high density of new vocabulary as to make the readings discouragingly difficult.If used by itself, this book may not be the best for self-study. However, I would recommend it as a supplement to any course. If you are having trouble with technical points of grammar, this book might make it easier for you. If you are taking a self-study program which espouses the "conversation-only" approach and lacks the grammatical information so useful to an intelligent adult, this book will provide it. I plan to keep it close at hand as a reference.

After completing this book you will have a very rudimentary understanding of the Chinese language. Your vocabulary will be limited, your aural comprehension will be weak at best, and only if you're very studious will you be able to properly pronunciate all the words that you do learn. That said, this is a good book especially when accompanied the audio cassettes. I had no previous knowledge of Mandarin Chinese before reading this book, although the little bit of Cantonese that I know helped somewhat. Now I can pick out a few words here and there when watching Chinese movies. Only with practice will I improve, although a vocabulary builder would be useful.

this book/tape, so far, beats all others that I have purchased. Besides all useful material, the completeness of the chinese instructions is what pleased me the most. I would recommend to all learners of Chinese Mandarin. In fact, it is better than the other version "Teach Yourself Chinese" by the same authors.