As I’m anticipating my trip to China in January, I’m going to start doing a lot more reading about the contemporary landscape, the hugely diverse culture, and the history of a country that’s existed in one form or another for thousands of years. This was a super-easy-to-read survey of all three of those things — and as it’s a National Geographic book, it has lots of great pictures to give you a feel for what he’s talking about. Makes me want to pick up his book The Chinese. This book does a great job going through 6ish main regions (Beijing, Shanghai, South of Shanghai, Pearl River Delta, Manchuria, Central China & Yunan Region) and talking about each. Good read.
[As an aside, I think I’m going to try ordering my books from Powell’s for a while. I’ve been an Amazon customer for a long time now — since 1996 — but just think that in spite of the high quality of service, I don’t have much alignment with them as a company. Powell’s is harder to order from — they don’t have “one-click”, for example, due to Amazon’s heinous patent strategy — but maybe that just proves the point for me. I also like the idea of making used books as easy to buy as new books, which Powell’s clearly has a stronger commitment to than Amazon. I’ll let you know how it goes. If anyone has experience with them already, let me know.]
Come on, John. Time to order your books on eBay Express. I’ve moved my DVD purchases over there lately, and I’m amazed at how quickly I’m getting the packages delivered.
If you want used books, I’m surprised you haven’t been using Half.com. Try them both, and I’d appreciate the feedback.
BTW Here is the link for this book on Half.com:
http://product.half.ebay.com/Dragon-Rising_W0QQprZ52330326QQtgZinfo
🙂
Come on, John. Time to order your books on eBay Express. I’ve moved my DVD purchases over there lately, and I’m amazed at how quickly I’m getting the packages delivered.
If you want used books, I’m surprised you haven’t been using Half.com. Try them both, and I’d appreciate the feedback.
BTW Here is the link for this book on Half.com:
http://product.half.ebay.com/Dragon-Rising_W0QQprZ52330326QQtgZinfo
🙂
Kristin and I just returned from China. We had a fantastic trip.
http://flickr.com/photos/davidcrow/sets/72157594386355758/
The culture is unique. Definitely 3 distinct personalities of cities and their people when comparing Hong Kong, Shanghai and Beijing. I really wish I had read more about Chinese history before visiting. The socio-economic and socio-political changes the resulted in the People’s Revolution (plus the 2 revolutions immediately before and the Cultural Revolution that followed) would have been insightful. A short history is available at http://www.asterius.com/china/
Kristin and I just returned from China. We had a fantastic trip.
http://flickr.com/photos/davidcrow/sets/72157594386355758/
The culture is unique. Definitely 3 distinct personalities of cities and their people when comparing Hong Kong, Shanghai and Beijing. I really wish I had read more about Chinese history before visiting. The socio-economic and socio-political changes the resulted in the People’s Revolution (plus the 2 revolutions immediately before and the Cultural Revolution that followed) would have been insightful. A short history is available at http://www.asterius.com/china/