Customer Rating: 
Summary: great tai chi book
Comment: I really liked this book. I have been studying Tai Chi for just over a year and a half, and this book is one of several recommended by my teacher. It doesn't teach you how to do Tai Chi, but the insights are great if you have been practicing consistently for awhile. I don't think it matters which form you study to enjoy this book. It's an easy read and I recommend it if you practice Tai Chi.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Insight
Comment: Fabulous insight into aspects of Tai Chi hinted at but never fully revealed in previous texts I have read. Definately worth adding to evrybody's library of information to enhance understanding of Tai Chi Chuan.
Customer Rating:
Summary: No secrets, just simple truths.
Comment: I cannot recommend this book highly enough to all martial artists. The author has done a first class job of capturing the humor and joy in life despite the many setbacks and disappointments suffered along the way.
The chapter on "Investing in Loss" alone is worth the price of the book many times over. The book as a whole is stuffed to the brim with lessons of one sort or another. I have bought and given out many copies of this book to fellow martial artists and plan to keep doing so.
Customer Rating: 
Summary: Actually, There WERE Secrets . . .
Comment: In taiji circles (no pun intended) it's common knowledge that Cheng taught select students a set of nei gong exercises that he found invaluable for taiji and even calligraphy. William C.C. Chen mentions receiving this training from Cheng in his book about taiji's body mechanics, and there was a group of Malaysian students (some of whom still teach) who got this training. Cheng didn't teach any of his American students this all-important nei gong (internal work) that is an essential part of taiji. He was known rarely to discuss it. Cheng was very secretive and he usually taught only the hand form. The hand form without the nei gong is really only half an art (though some would say the nei gong is in the form). Lowenthal learned the form and push hands, and had a great time, and his enthusiasm for Cheng comes through, as does much of Cheng's personality, which was wise, mischievous, and cultured. So if you want to read a series of anecdotes, which is what the book contains, it's defintely worth buying--particularly if you're a Ching devotee. But don't expect instruction. It's not a textbook or manual, but a memoir.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Pieces of Gold, interspersed with Psychological Angst
Comment: Pieces of Gold, interspersed with Lowenthal's Psychological Angst
All of the preceding reviewers points of view are mostly true, this book has some great gems and insights into Professor Cheng Man-ch'ings Mastery of Tai Chi. Unfortunatly much of the book is like wading through a "bad" Woody Allen movie, full of Upper middle class, eastern U.S., psycho-babble and Angst. Lowenthal would have written a much much better book if he had stayed with Tai Chi Chuan and left his tortured/guilt ridden pysche & memories out of the book. What Lowental's memories of Professor add to the text, his personal commentaries about his own past, psychological "insights" etc. take away.
If I had a very limited amount of money to spend, and I wanted to maximize my reading on Tai Chi, I would go for those books written by Prof Cheng, like His Thirteen Treatises, or the Essence of Tai Chi by Lo/Inn and save Lowenthal's books for when I am interested in much lighter fare.
