Heisig and Sienko's text provides students learning Japanese as a foreign/second language with 1,000 additional characters beyond the Japanese government-approved list of the basic 2,000
educational kanji, to equip them for upper-level Japanese studies. Separate parts of the book address the writing and reading of the characters. The text features six indexes, including
hand-drawn samples of the new characters introduced and cumulative lists of the key words and primitive meanings, and of the Chinese and Japanese pronunciations appearing in all three volumes
of the series. Changes from the first (1994) to the second edition of the text are not stated. Heisig is with the Nanzan Institute for Religion and Culture, Nagoya, Japan; Sienko previously
worked for the Japanese government and Japanese industry for ten years and now is an entrepreneur in the U.S. Annotation 穢2008 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
