Title: Colloquial Chinese: A Complete Language Course Author: Qian Kan Level: Basic

Buy it here! (UK)

I took part in an evening course for Mandarin and didn't really have time to explore this in any great detail but over all it was OK.

It is a simple book to get into and the chapters are in a conistant pattern which allows you to know what to expect in the coming chapters. That can be comforting or boring, it depends how long you are using the book for. This book would really need to be used in conjunction with other more detailed materials. The worst part of this book is the explanation of the grammar points. They're sometimes a real challenge to get to grips with.