Customer Reviews

Practical Chinese Reader, III (Mandarin Chinese Edition)

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Due to its old age and the advent of the New Practical Chinese Reader, I don't recommend this book as a main textbook, but as a supplement for those in their 4th to 5th semester of college Chinese, this is an excellent supplement. The readers are no longer short as they are in the first two volumes of PCR, but they are longer and more interesting. Each of the 15 chapters introduces around 60 new vocabulary words and topics range from talking about travel plans to Taiji to family. Although the book is outdated, most of the information is pretty good. And in keeping with the tradition of the PCR series, the grammar explanations are EXCELLENT. Example sentences are used to further illustrate the usage of certain words and grammatical structure, and a glossary index of the vocabulary words is in the back of the book. Overall, an excellent supplement.

I'm currently working on this book on my own after 1) a year of semi-intensive Chinese in graduate school many years ago, 2) having traveled in China and Taiwan, and 3) taking second-year Chinese using Practical Chinese Reader II not quite so many years ago.

I agree with the review who said that the readings are interesting and introduce a lot of vocabulary. The grammar explanations could be a bit clearer, and it would help if there were English translations to explain some of the subtleties. It would also be helpful to have answers to the exercises in the back of the book or in an easily available separate volume. I feel that I'm improving my reading skills, but I'd hesitate to claim to speak or write above the level that I achieved in second-year Chinese.

The tapes, too, while helpful to some extent, are a bit old-fashioned in their approach: all they do is read the reading selections, two related dialogues, and the vocabulary list. More up-to-date language courses include listening exercises and sometimes even "realia," such as simple snippets from radio or TV broadcasts.

However, I plan to keep plugging along, since I was able to pick up the whole series for $10 at a used bookstore about five years ago.