A big disappointment
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I am normally a fan of the dummies books, but this one really is of low quality. There are mistakes in the Pinyin transliterations of the Chinese. Now, one or two mistakes in a book is forgiveable, but the number of mistakes in this one is far too high, possibly leaving the reader thinking that they are mistaken rather than the book.
Whilst the CD recording is of a reasonable quality, the book itself is poorly written, and the more subtle points of Chinese grammar are skirted over rather than faced head on.
I do understand, of course, that this is not a textbook written for the academically minded, but I do not believe that that is an excuse for academically poor material.
A reasonable introduction, I guess, to the language, this book is little more than a fuller phrase book. Either get a phrase book, or if you're serious about learning Chinese, get a book that teaches you the characters too.
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Someething good, something bad.
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Chinese is a difficult language. After buying and toiling with several different textbooks, I discovered Chinese for Dummies, and had no problem in admitting I belong to the target group.
After a few weeks studying this book, Chinese is still a difficult language. Pronunciation rules for pinyin are explained in part I , in addition the sounds are demonstrated on an accompanying audio CD. Pinyin is in itself a phonetic transcription of Chinese characters. To further phonetically transcibe pinyin into ”English” seems superfluous. However, such phonetic transcription is done throughout the book, after every Chinese word or sentence, which makes reading difficult and adds to confusion A few examples: Qing tian zheige biao (Cheeng tyan jay guh byaow), Ni shuo Yingwen ma? (Nee shwaw eeng one mah). The English transciption in paretheses are just a source of irritation,as are several misprints.
On the positive side I find the choice of subjects for conversations, word lists, points of cultural rules and taboos. However, a claim that one can undergo major surgery without Western anaesthesia, only using acupuncture, is more than dubious.
I would consider the following three books better choices:
Ultimate Mandarin Chinese (Living Language)
Colloquial Chinese (Kan Qian)
Chinese in Three Months (Hugo)
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