A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers by Xiaolu Guo

According to the blurb this book is "original, humourous and wise". Well, let's think about this.

Is it original? - yep. Certainly original. It's written from the point of view of a young Chinese woman who is visiting England for a year to improve her language skills. And it is written as she would speak. Not phonetically, but in terms of the sentence structure - I'm sure there's a word for this, and as a literature graduate I should probably know it, but I don't. It's a great device. It's the old - making the ordinary extraordinary trick. And she's a likable character, right up until she takes up with the fella....

Is it humourous? Yes, in a sad, sweet way it is humourous. It highlights the idiocy and idiosyncrasies of the English language and the daft customs and habits that we hold fast to. It's not belly laugh funny though - but that's a good thing.

Is it wise? I'm not sure. It's very thoughtful and I loved it, but I didn't finish it and feel that I'd uncovered a deep secret of the universe, or that an undeniable truth had been revealed to me.I did come away from it feeling rather like I did after reading some of the books of the 60s and 70s that belonged to my mum. Books about impressionable young women who finally make a bid for freedom from their stifling conventional lives only to fall head over heels in love with older men, be used and left disillusioned by them before creeping back to their conventional lives.

The fella really gave me the creeps, I didn’t like him at all.This is a good one, it's still in my mind which is always a good sign.