Customer Reviews

Tiananmen Diary: 13 Days in June

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Famous American "star" journalists are well known for their bland, conformist mindsets, and their bad writing. This book is just another badly written and incredibly trite "travel diary". Much of the book has Salisbury anachronistically hyping his own career, but even the accounts of 1989 fail as a human interest story. As history or journalism, the book is useless, as it gives no background or context, and darn little content.

The reviews for this book seem to be either really good or really bad.

I found the book to be an enjoyable read. Yes, it defiantely is "light", and of course its not intended to be a comprehensive documentary. If one reads this book for what it is, the journal of a media individual on a very upheaved time in Chiense history, they will certainly not be disappointed.

Harrison writes briefly, with just the right amount of detail. After reading this, you will not know everything about the happenings in Tiananmen, but you will get a good partial view of it. And, yes, the author's writing style is not amazing, but it really is good enough for this sort of a book and it is very functional.

This book was a fascinating read that really opened my eyes to what happened in 1989 during the Tianamen square massacre. I'm not sure the reader from new york and myself read the same book. Salsibury was in his hotel room during some of the events, but I don't blame him. With a totalitarian government's army on the loose against its citizenry, I'm not sure I could call his actions cowardly. This book is a must read for those of you uninformed on the horrific events that occured in this country that we Americans give "Most favored Nation" status. Happy hunting to find it, since its out of print.

This is about the stupidest book on China I have ever read, and the worst account of the Tian'anmen Massacre. While people were being killed, he was cowering in his hotel room, upset because the incident was upsetting his TV shooting schedule. Come on get real! A friend sent me t his while I was living in Beijing, and it provided us with some good laughs! I always thought he was a respected journalist, but t his book really left me wondering.