The Journey to the West, Books 1, 2 and 3: Three Classic Stories in Simplified Chinese and Pinyin, 600 Word Vocabulary Level (Journey to the West in Simplified Chinese)

I've been stuck between HSK2/HSK3 for a while now (I've been self studying vocabulary, simple grammar, online listening, movies, duo lingo, pimsleur, and a bit of conversation practice with online tutors). I needed something more to propel me forward and give me a sense of context & purpose for mastering HSK 3. I love to read, so this engaging story in a user friendly format is just what I needed. I love the pinyin on the opposite page and if I don't know the character I can often understand from the pinyin. I use the glossary less often and only when I can't grasp the meaning from context or with the help of the pinyin. I plan on listening and reading along with the audio version after I finish reading, to reinforce pronunciation and character recognition. Will definitely order more of their books, because of the awesome format and literary quality.

It's difficult to find good learning materials in Chinese in general, but it seems particularly hard to find reading resources that aren't too hard or too easy. These books manage to hit the mark. Not only that, but they do it in a way that's challenging and fun. Add to that the fact that the source material is a fiction favorite in Chinese culture, and you have a literary win across the board.New vocabulary is introduced in a way that makes it easy to learn, and the spaced repetition of the new words reinforces their meaning and helps you remember. I'm on my seventh book in the series now and am very satisfied with the way they become progressively difficult without becoming frustrating. I often find myself lost in the story and forget that I'm learning another language altogether.I can't think of higher praise than that.

This book is great. Easy to read and I really like the layout - left page has pinyin and the right page has the hanzi. A lot of books do the pinyin above each line of hanzi, which makes it hard to read without focusing on the pinyin too much. Also, any advanced words are defined at the bottom of the page where they are introduced. The back of the book has the English translation, a lot of proper nouns, and a glossary of every single Chinese word used in the book! Highly recommend this book for all Chinese learners!

My favorite thing about these graded readers is that they are real novels. Yes, they are simplified versions with "easier" language than the originals, but they are real stories that every Chinese person I interact with knows about (and has probably read!). Most graded content are "articles" that lasts a few minutes at most. With this book, I escaped for 2 hours in pure reading pleasure in Chinese. I can't recommend this enough. Also, their vocabulary is now on hackchinese if you use it to study.

This book was great for me as a Chinese-American (re-)learning how to read Chinese: the language is very, very simple, but the story is interesting enough to hold your attention.For reference, when I picked this book up, I could speak at an early elementary school level but recognized only a few dozen, maybe 100, characters. The beginning was *rough* - I think it took me an hour to read the first page - but characters and phrases repeat a lot, so I found my footing pretty quickly. I think the sweet spot for me at which the text was somewhat comfortable to read but still challenging was when I could recognize on the order of 400 characters. (To be clear, I didn't get to 400 characters from this volume alone. I read the first 9 books in this series.)I like that the pinyin and the Chinese text are on different pages. In most children's books, the pinyin is right above or below the characters, which makes it far too easy for those of us who can speak but not read to cheat and only read the pinyin!The reason I rated the book 4 stars rather than 5 is that it occasionally contains the wrong pronunciation for characters that have multiple pronunciations. But it's still the best (really, the only) full-length novel I've found that's approachable for beginners.

I've read numerous graded readers from a number of companies, this one of the best for its level (600 word/HSK 3). Being a major historical and cultural story makes it all that much better and it keeps you reading just because it's a great story.I love the organization with pinyin on the left and hanzi on the right so it's easy to cover up/not look at the pinyin unless needed. At the very end there's also an English translation in case something isn't clear, but not so accessible that it's easy to use as a crutch.There's also a free audio version they mention so you can read along or listen, etc.The whole thing doesn't seem like even studying at all, very enjoyable!

I really enjoy reading this. 10/10 would buy again.

This book exceeded my expectations! It highlights phrases in the book that may be unfamiliar and at the bottom of the page you can see the pinyin as well as english translations. The book is beginner friendly, with pinyin on the left side and characters on the right. I am currently at HSK4 level and could read a majority of it without pinyin, but there were still many words I still needed to learn which I loved.It also includes the book completely translated to english after the chinese version, as well as beautiful images occasionally that go with certain sentences in the book. i did not expect it, and it was a lovely addition!