James Kynge: China Shakes the World: A Titan's Rise and Troubled Future - and the Challenge for America. 2006 (Houghton Mifflin)

Former bureau chief of the Financial Times in Beijing explains why China is re-defining the world order.

Maurice Meisner: Mao's China and After: A History of the People's Republic. 3rd Ed. 1999 (Free Press)

Li Zhisui: The Private Life of Chairman Mao: The Memories of Mao's Personal Physician. 1994 (Random House)

Jung Chang: Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China. 2003 (Touchstone)

Chang Jung / Jon Halliday: Mao - The Unknown Story. 2005 (Knopf)

Susan L. Shirk: China: Fragile Superpower: How China's Internal Politics Could Derail Its Peaceful Rise. 2007 (Oxford University Press)

Excellent analysis of China's internal fault lines.

Jan Wong: Red China Blues: My Long March from Mao to Now. 1997 (Anchor)

Personal, humorous memoir.

Barry Naughton: The Chinese Economy: Transitions and Growth. 2007 (The MIT Press)

A leading specialist analyzes the Chinese economy. Enzyclopedic text book.

Philip Short: Mao - A Live. Reprint Ed. 2001 (Owl Books)

Solid.

Andrew J. Nathan / Bruce Gilley: China's New Rulers: The Secret Files. 2nd Rev. Ed. 2003 (New York Review Books)