Study New Languages

One of the things about Chinese characters that is really interesting is that you can learn to read and interpret them without needing to learn to pronounce them. This is good/bad at the same time. It’s good because you can quickly gain confidence in your understanding of the written language. It’s bad because you will not necessarily learn pronunciation/verbal language hand in hand with the written language.

Chinese Character Fast Finder – This book helps you look up Chinese characters without having to know their pronunciation or radicals/stroke count/etc. Very well rated reference.

Tuttle Learning Chinese Characters Volume 1 – this is a guide for learning your first 800 Chinese Characters. The method is well reviewed and looks to be worth a try.